


the sacred simplicity (of you at my side)

by orphan_account



Category: Glee
Genre: Bottom Blaine, Dom!Kurt, M/M, Top Kurt Hummel, lots of BDSM for everyone, sub!Blaine
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-11-20
Updated: 2015-03-09
Packaged: 2018-02-26 08:36:32
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 13
Words: 37,104
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2645312
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Kurt is the stablemaster. Blaine is the prince. They live in a world of dominants and submissives, but this is not a story about dominants and submissives. This is a story about them.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. prologue

**Author's Note:**

  * For [blushingblainey](https://archiveofourown.org/users/blushingblainey/gifts).

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> backstory, really.

The day his father died, humans were no comfort. As soon as Kitty, face ashen but still hardened, delivered to him the news, he fled to the horses. Whip in one hand and reins in the other, he mounted his favorite mare, Beth, and took off from all he had ever known—the fertile country encased in trees and withering foliage—to the cobblestone paved market, the city, the palace. It was there he applied for his first job as stable boy, and, as the years past, eventually grew into the stablemaster. Surrounded by the horses and the barn cats, he had never been more at home.  
  
-  
  
The day the king took to his deathbed and bade his two sons come hither, the young prince and his brother came solemn-faced to hear their destiny. The older brother, Prince Cooper, had never wanted anything to do with the throne, but King Anderson would not have the younger rule. In fact, his dying words wished that Prince Blaine never take the throne as long as he lived. Why he was so adamant about this, Blaine did not know. He sensed that Cooper did, but no matter how he tried to pry the matter out of his brother, the subject always changed, and Cooper would point at him with a menacing finger and put him to his room.  
  
-  
  
A few years before Kurt took to the role of stablemaster, the then residing stablemaster took him aside and explained the roles of the dominants and submissives within the palace. Kurt had by then been marked dominant, as he’d expected, which, while unorthodox for a slave, was not unheard of. The stablemaster told Kurt of the two princes, the older dominant and the younger submissive, and how though the older was not fit to rule a kingdom, the king would not have the submissive take over the land. And then he introduced Kurt to the young man who was to become his first sub, an enthusiastic guard named Chandler. He and Kurt were each other’s first everything, and even when it became apparent they were not to last long, they remained close friends—Kurt helped Chandler through his sickness, and when Kurt had a bad day, Chandler was there to submit.  
-  
  
A palace guard named Chandler who was only a year Blaine’s senior was named to be his tutor after Blaine turned fifteen. Chandler was the one who told him what a dominant was, and how Blaine, as a submissive, would soon need one. The idea frightened Blaine to no end, and, no matter how Chandler tried to comfort him and tell him that dominants were not horrible controlling monsters, he never quite convinced him. It was that year that Blaine started to frequent the stables, mostly to get away from the humans, but after awhile, when it became apparent that he had a knack with animals, he would also go to feed the horses and pet the barn cats. Even the crabbiest cat, Mabel, could not resist purring when Blaine scratched between her eats.  
  
It was also that year that Blaine first took notice of the stablemaster, and that the stablemaster took notice of him.


	2. chapter one

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> this is how they meet, this is how it begins. (this is also where the sex first comes in. i don't waste my time with this shit.)

Cooper’s finger shakes with anger as he points it dramatically at Blaine. It had once been a threatening gesture, but now Blaine only has to pretend to be afraid. As soon as Cooper has slammed Blaine’s bedroom door shut and stomped off down the stairwell, Blaine rolls his eyes and slips out his open window. The summer heat is sharp on his scalp and back, and he can already feel his curls attempting to frizz loose from the constricting gels he had put in it in an attempt to make it look orderly. He scales his way expertly down the stone wall, using vines and places where the stone had crumbled off to assist. When he reaches the ground, he walks briskly to the stable and is greeted lovingly by Mabel, Maple, and Margaret, the three old barn cats. Their kittens follow after, too young to be distinguished from the others and therefore too young to be named. Blaine drops to his knees and lets them rub against his legs and arms, stroking their backs and heads and smiling softly as they began to purr.  
  
The ground trembles sudden and harsh beneath his legs, and Blaine looks up to see a horse rush into the stable. The rider dismounts smoothly from its back as it charges into a stall. As soon as the horse is still he locks it in. “Easy, sweetie,” he says soothingly as the horse tosses its head and bucks at him. Then he bows his head, noticing Blaine. “We met a flock of birds on our ride. This one—” He rubs the horse’s nose as it begins to calm down—“is not a fan of wings.”  
  
“Oh,” Blaine manages politely, trying to not see the way the rider’s strikingly blue eyes rake along his figure, causing his eyebrows to dart up and mouth to quirk in amusement once they alight on the silver circlet on his head.  
  
“And what are you doing here, Prince Blaine?” he asks, smirking. “Escaping your studies with Chandler so early?”  
  
“I—” Blaine says, uncertain if he liked the way the word ‘prince’ fell from the man’s lips. Abruptly he realizes he is still on his knees and springs up quickly, dispersing the cats from his body. “I’m sorry, I’m afraid I don’t know your name, sir?” He ignores how ‘sir’ felt, so natural on his tongue.  
  
“I’m Kurt, the stablemaster,” says the man, still looking incredibly amused for reasons Blaine cannot fathom. “Interesting we have not met, since you make a habit of frequenting the stable.”  
  
“I’m sorry,” Blaine says again. “I normally see Jake and Ryder here, and they tell me that the stablemaster is out riding whenever he possibly can.”  
  
Kurt blinks. “I suppose that is true, your majesty.” He seems subdued of a sudden, and Blaine instantly misses the way the light had danced mischievous in his eyes.  
  
“It’s not a problem,” he hastens to say, dragging his gaze from Kurt’s face to where his right hand grasps a whip casually—then snaps his eyes back to Kurt’s when something strange stirs in his stomach.  
  
“Has Chandler been teaching you well, though?” Kurt says with a small frown. “Why do you need to escape his lessons?”  
  
Blaine shakes his head minutely, eyes downcast again. “Mr. Chandler is a fine teacher. I just—didn’t feel like learning.”  
  
Kurt smiles gently at Blaine’s stammered excuse. “Is today the day he was going to teach you about the submissive sickness?”  
  
Blaine’s eyes fly shut. He exhales a shaky breath. When did one word become so difficult to say? “Yes.”  
  
“It’s not as scary as you’d think,” Kurt continues, as if he hasn’t heard Blaine’s admission. “I helped Chandler through his first. If you let it—” he clears his throat, and Blaine lets his eyes open to see nothing but raw honesty on Kurt’s face. “It can even feel good.”  
  
“I—” Blaine says, “I—” An almost overpowering urge to fall to his knees and cry rushes through him. Instead he straightens his back, takes a long breath. “I should go.”  
  
He turns and runs back to the palace, climbs the wall to his window to find Chandler perching on his bed.  
  
In the stable, Kurt idly flicks his whip and wonders who will be there to help Blaine through the first rush of submission.  
  
-  
  
“Are you ready to begin the lesson now?” Chandler’s voice is soft but intrudes on Blaine’s ears all the same.  
  
“I was at the stable,” he blurts before he can think about what he is going to say.  
  
Chandler arches an eyebrow. “Did you see Kurt?”  
  
“Yes,” Blaine says. He means it to be defiant, but it comes out gentle. Chandler grins at him brightly.  
  
“And?”  
  
“I wanted to come back here to, um, learn.” Blaine isn’t really sure what Chandler is asking of him. Chandler rolls his eyes and pats the bed beside him. Blaine sits obediently.  
  
“Sure. Alright, so, sub sickness. You’re fifteen, and you’ve been marked, which means that it will happen any day now. You don’t want to have it near people you don’t trust—sub sickness is when you are your most vulnerable and you can’t have anyone take advantage of you.”  
  
“How was your first?” Blaine says. Curiosity flares through him, sharp and sudden. “Kurt, uh, Kurt said it could feel good if you let it.” He flushes when he sees how Chandler’s grin falls. “Never mind. That was personal, I’m sorry.”  
  
Chandler looks Blaine directly in the eyes and takes both of his hands in his. “Is this something you want to know?”  
  
“I—”  
  
“Answer me honestly, please.”  
  
“Yes.” Blaine’s voice is barely a whisper. He pretends to study the pattern of his bedding. The image of Kurt’s fingers gripping the whip skillfully comes unbidden to his mind, and he barely withholds his gasp at it.  
  
“It was frightening at first, yes,” Chandler says quietly. He’s not looking at Blaine anymore, seemingly lost in his thoughts. “But Kurt took good care of me. He helped me to relax so it wouldn’t be so painful. He—he did me a lot of good,” Chandler finishes, coming back from his head as he does so. “We shared many firsts.”  
  
A pang of jealousy twists in Blaine’s chest. “Are you still together?”  
  
Chandler laughs. “Oh, no. No, we are good friends, but it was never more than that. We had a lot of fun—it was never serious, good as it was.”  
  
Confusing relief floods through Blaine. “Oh.”  
  
Chandler continues to teach for a good half hour after, but Blaine isn’t really there. He can’t stop seeing Kurt’s blue eyes piercing his own and imagining how foolish he must’ve looked when Kurt first saw him, on his knees surrounded by cats.  
  
-  
  
Later, when the palace has gone to bed for the night, Blaine awakens to something wet and warm seeping through his pajama trousers. He squirms uncomfortably and carefully sits up, peeling back his trousers to reveal his cock standing hard against his abdomen, clear liquid beading at its head. Blaine freezes. He remembers Chandler detailing this in their lesson—he had had a wet dream. But what had he been dreaming about?  
  
The broadness of Kurt’s shoulders, the hint of amusement in his smirk, the way he stood with his legs set shoulder-width apart, powerful and built, his long fingers holding the riding whip—  
  
Blaine whines loudly and then covers his mouth with his hand. If someone heard—  
  
His cock twitches violently and Blaine suppresses another whimper. Chandler had said to touch it when it did this—but how was he supposed to do that? He fears touching his cock might make the pain coiling in his belly worse: an experimental press to its base confirms that. Maybe he didn’t have to touch his cock. Maybe—he leans back on his bed, feeling a flush of heat to his groin when he spreads his legs and cold night air caresses his balls and lower.  
  
Gently, he takes his balls in one hand, careful to not graze his cock, and gives a tentative squeeze. The pressure makes him yelp, and he bites down on the hand still over his mouth to stop the noise. He inhales sharply through his nose and pulls his pajamas back over his cock, desperately ignoring the way that the fabric stretched over his hardness.  
  
He doesn’t sleep at all the rest of the night. No matter how he tosses and turns, no position is comfortable.  
  
-  
  
When morning comes, his cock is softer than it was, but still tents his breeches obscenely. Blaine crawls back into bed and claims illness for the rest of the day to avoid getting up. He is starving by the time noon rolls around, but it’s worth it.  
  
-  
  
The wet dreams happen twice more after that and then stop altogether, coincidentally on the day that Blaine doesn’t visit the stable.  
  
Chandler tells him in the lesson that day that men can have sex with other men and even go inside them with their cock. When Blaine wonders aloud where on earth a cock can fit in a man’s body beside a mouth, Chandler explains about anal penetration with more delight than he probably should, and Blaine isn’t sure the blush leaves his face for the rest of the day.  
  
That night in bed, he practically bends himself in two trying to get a good look at what Chandler had called his ‘hole.’ It looks, from what Blaine can see of it, absolutely tiny, and how anything even slightly phallic is supposed to fit up it Blaine has no idea.  
  
-  
  
A few weeks after he thought the wet dreams had stopped for good, he’s visiting the stable when Kurt is there again. Kurt is grooming the stallions and Blaine is feeding the fillies oats and hay when a bout of dizziness causes him to collapse.  
  
“Blaine? Are you alright?” Kurt’s face swims above his vision, and Blaine tries to respond but can only form groans. He blushes bright red when he feels his cock harden under his breeches. Kurt’s fingers circle his wrist suddenly, and he looks up through his eyelashes, not trusting himself to speak, not even sure if he can.  
  
“This is your sickness,” Kurt says, voice quiet but firm. “I’m going to take you to my quarters and help you there. Is that alright?”  
  
Blaine doesn’t know if he nods at all, but Kurt is pulling him to his feet and then—to Blaine’s utter embarrassment—scoops him up whole, one arm across his back and the other under his knees so that Blaine’s straining cock is clearly visible. He tries to protest, but Kurt is carrying him to the small house behind the stable and barn that serves as the stable slaves’ quarters. Kurt lays him on a low bed covered in cushions and blankets and kneels next to him. The sight of Kurt on his knees doesn’t feel right to Blaine for some reason, and he breathes easier when Kurt props him up on pillows and sits on the bed instead.  
  
“Tell me when you’re going to come.” It’s an order, and that makes Blaine shiver without knowing why. He doesn’t know what ‘come’ means in this context, but the last thing he wants to do right now is question or, worse, disobey. He nods swiftly and then Kurt is undoing the laces of his breeches and Blaine yells because Kurt’s hand is stroking Blaine’s cock and he can’t feel anything but the press of Kurt’s fingers against his skin.  
  
“Stay still,” Kurt says, another order, and Blaine bites his lip so hard he thinks it might bleed. “There you go. Good boy.” The praise makes Blaine’s eyes roll back in his head and Kurt’s palm cups Blaine’s balls softly. “So beautiful, honey. That’s it.”  
  
Blaine can’t breathe. Kurt’s hands are so gentle on him, stroking the leaking tip of his cock and smearing the fluids down to his base, getting it sticky in his pubic hair, and around his balls. Everything is so, so good, and he never wants it to end, wants to lay here forever with Kurt’s hands on him and around him—  
  
And then the hand cupping his balls brushes the silky skin below them and the hand around his cock squeezes hard and a noise rips from Blaine’s lips strangled and loud and his cock is spurting long strands of opalescent fluid and it’s getting everywhere. It’s all over the bedsheets and Kurt’s hands and Blaine’s heaving belly, but most of it has stained his shirt, how is he going to go back to the palace like this?  
  
Kurt’s fingers deftly undo the buttons of Blaine’s shirt. “Arms up,” he says, not a command, but Blaine complies anyway. He’d be embarrassed for Kurt to see him shirtless in any other situation, but given that Kurt had just helped him through his first sickness, being shirtless is sort of the last issue on Blaine’s mind. Kurt’s fingers, slick with the fluid Blaine’s cock had produced, are against his mouth. “Open.” Blaine tastes himself, salty and bitter and foreign, and makes a face. Kurt laughs, standing and turning away, and Blaine whines before he can stop himself.  
  
“Where are you going?”  
  
“To get a cloth to clean you, sweetie. I’m not going anywhere.” Kurt takes a thin cloth from a rack and runs it under tap water before he’s back sitting on the bed, and his fingers have found Blaine’s balls and are almost absentmindedly playing with them. Kurt drags the cloth softly over Blaine’s belly and cock, making him hiss with oversensitivity. He scrubs his long fingers clean of Blaine’s fluid and tosses the cloth aside to where Blaine’s shirt landed before. “What do you need?”  
  
It’s an unexpected question, and one of Kurt’s hands is still cradling his balls, no longer moving slowly, just there, and Blaine wants so much in that moment he could burst with it. But what he needs—what he needs—  
  
“Could you, just, could you—” It seems like such a selfish request after everything Kurt just did for him. But those blue eyes are still looking calmly at him, waiting patiently for a response. “Could you hold me?” Kurt’s face softens and he nods.  
  
“Of course.” Blaine shifts over to make room for him on the small bed, but there’s still not quite enough space, so Kurt ends up facing Blaine with their legs entwined and one hand presses under Blaine’s shoulderblades, forcing them closer, and the other is still under Blaine’s flaccid cock, warm weight on his balls.  
  
They lay there until it grows dark, and Blaine is jolted awake by Kurt’s lips on his temple—he hadn’t even realized that he’d fallen asleep.  
  
“I need to get you back to the palace,” Kurt whispers, breath hot on his ear. “Will you be okay there?”  
  
The palace is the last place Blaine wants to be, and he tells Kurt as much. He feels the stablemaster sigh against his curls, which have sprung completely free of their gel by now.  
  
“Blaine,” he starts, and then falls silent again. His fingers trace over Blaine’s cheekbones and over the swell of his lips. “You’re so lovely,” Kurt says into his hair. “Would that I could keep you here as long as I wanted, I would never let you go.”  
  
Blaine turns his hot face into Kurt’s chest. Tears are in his eyes, though he doesn’t know what put them there.  
  
“This is only the first bout of sickness, is it not?” he says, furrowing his brow in thought when Kurt hums affirmation. “Then you could keep me here—say I am ill and you don’t want to contaminate the royal quarters—” He feels Kurt’s smile in the darkness.  
  
“You don’t understand, do you?”  
  
“Understand what?” Blaine knows he’s being petulant, but Kurt just shifts closer to him on the bed. It is then he notices that his cock has hardened again, and that Kurt has his fingers wrapped around its base.  
  
“This—” Kurt’s fingers squeeze his cock gently, an imitation of their previous intimacy—“between a slave and a prince? Unspeakable.”  
  
“You—” Blaine struggles to think with Kurt’s fingers touching him so hotly. “You’re a stablemaster, though. You don’t share your quarters with anyone else—you are no slave.”  
  
“Not in your eyes, perhaps,” Kurt says, thumb swiping the head of Blaine’s cock absently. “In the eyes of the law? This is blasphemy. I never should’ve taken you here—should’ve called in your brother, he’s the one who should’ve done this—”  
  
“You regret it, then?” Blaine accuses, turning away from Kurt as much as he can without falling from the bed, which is not much because the bed is tiny and because Kurt’s hand is still wrapped firmly round his cock. “You think my first should’ve been my brother? You think I want Cooper to touch me like this? I don’t want that with him—I don’t—” He feels tears build beneath his eyelids, and then Kurt’s mouth on his face kissing them away.  
  
“It’s the tradition,” Kurt murmurs, brushing their noses together. “The dominant closest in age and bloodline to a submissive royal must help his sickness. I share no blood with you so closely as your brother, sweetheart. This is not right.”  
  
“But Cooper isn’t—he doesn’t—he prefers women,” Blaine says, an idea sparking in his head. “He would be grateful to be relieved of that duty, please—” Kurt kisses his forehead.  
  
“Don’t you beg,” he says, hand on Blaine’s cock giving a firm stroke that causes Blaine to whimper. “I will deny you absolutely nothing if you beg.”  
  
Blaine widens his eyes as far as they will go and meets Kurt’s gaze through his eyelashes. “Please, sir, please—we don’t have to say it’s you, just say Chandler and I have found someone to help me with my sickness—a specialist, please—”  
  
Kurt growls suddenly, hands leaping to Blaine’s wrists and pinning them over his head as he forces a knee between Blaine’s legs and rubs his thigh into Blaine’s hard cock. Blaine moans, long and low, as Kurt covers him completely with his body from head to toe, holding him to the bed.  
  
“I swear to the gods,” he says, breath hot on Blaine’s mouth, “you may be royalty, but I will wreck you—”  
  
Then his weight is gone from Blaine as Kurt slumps down onto the edge of the bed and puts his hands in his hair.  
  
“I can’t, I can’t, I can’t possibly do this. You are so young—not even legal, by the gods, I refuse.”  
  
“Then you do regret it,” Blaine says to himself, willing the tears to not fall. “You don’t want me, I am too young, of the wrong blood, and you don’t—”  
  
Kurt’s head jerks up. “Did I say that I did not want you? Gods, Blaine, I take you into my own bed, my quarters, and take from you your first, and I say I can’t do anything more—does that say to you that I for an instant regret this?”  
  
Blaine opens his mouth and closes it.  
  
“From the moment I first saw you, you were on your knees, and so innocent, and you think—you think that I didn’t want? You haven’t noticed how whenever you are turned from me all I see is the swell of your ass beneath your breeches? And when you face me, gods, you are so small, so delicate, and to be denied all of you though I am a dominant because of your bloodline? Did you think that I was in pain every moment you were near because I didn’t want you?”  
  
Kurt drops his head to his hands again and Blaine says so quiet to the night, “I’m sorry. I’m sorry, Kurt.”  
  
At hearing his name from Blaine’s lips something seems to break within the man. “Get out. Get out of my house—”  
  
Blaine tugs his breeches over his cock and laces the front flaps too tight and runs—runs from his conflict, runs from everything that he’s ever wanted, back to his room and only when he collapses onto his bed does he realize that he’s forgotten his shirt.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this will update every saturday and/or sunday as i see fit. i've got six chapters already written but they'll be posted gradually. there is lots of sex. do not worry. there is SO. MUCH. SEX.


	3. chapter two

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> featuring handjobs, blowjobs, a petulant cat--more or less what you expected. warnings for secondhand embarrassment.

Kurt tells Ryder and Jake that he is leaving them with the new hand, Sam, and going to visit some relatives who he has not seen in years.  
  
It’s not far from the truth, as he mounts Beth and leads her at a canter through the path that he hasn’t taken since he first came to the city, the one that is only a few days’ journey from where he grew up—though he can no longer think of it as his home.  
  
It is the day after the next when he arrives, sunlight pouring through the trees. He finds Kitty immediately, and though she hates physical affection, she lets herself be hugged, and gruffly pats his back.  
  
“What is it, what’s the matter with you?” she says as he pulls back, getting a good look at his tear-streaked face and windswept hair. “You look fucking awful.”  
  
Kurt attempts a laugh, but it comes out more a sob, and says, “How’s Marley?” referring to Kitty’s submissive.  
  
He expects her to light up at the mention of her girlfriend, instead, she slumps quiet and says, “Answer my question first. Then I’ll tell you.”  
  
They go inside and sip cold tea at the kitchen table, and Kurt details the entirety of his foolishness with the prince and then can’t stop his hands from shaking even when his tears cease.  
  
Kitty is silent for only a moment. “You fucked up,” she says, nodding in the wisely infuriating way she has. “But you care about him, which makes it worse—don’t deny that,” she barks when he opens his mouth, “don’t do it, because I’ve spent years with your bull and I can still see right through it. You care about him. Is the problem that he’s too young to know what he wants? You can’t be sure that he really wants you because he’s basically a cat in heat and will hump anything that moves?”  
  
Kurt chokes on his tea. “Um.”  
  
“Oh, hit a nerve, did I?”  
  
“Not just one,” Kurt sighs. “But are we not going to discuss the fact that he’s royal and I’m a slave and he’s not even a legal adult?”  
  
Kitty shrugs. “It’s happened before, the royal and the slave hooking up. Just keep it hush-hush around the other royals—the other slaves will probably pat your ass and say it’s about time you found someone to fuck.” Kurt raises a shoulder; she’s not wrong.  
  
“Okay, fine. Easier said than done, but fine. Marley?”  
  
Kitty’s eyes slide to the woodwork of the table. “I fucked up even worse than you did, Kurt.”  
  
“Mm?”  
  
Her hands circle the cup of tea, but she doesn’t pick it up. “I pushed it, I mean. We were doing fine till I pressured her for sex and she said some crap about waiting and I said we’ve been together five whole years, what on earth do you mean I have to wait more, and she said that she might be interested in men.”  
  
“Oh, gods.” Kurt finds one of Kitty’s hands from the tea cup and holds it gently for a second before she snatches it away.  
  
“That was my reaction, yes. But you know how I can’t keep my mouth shut. So I told her she was fat and ugly and disgusting and no man would ever want her, anyway, and now she’s gone and I’ve asked everyone where she might be and—” Kitty turns her face to her shoulder in a failed attempt to hide her tears. “Of course everyone loves Marley, and no one ever really liked me except you, so they’re all on her side and protecting her.”  
  
“So they know where she is?”  
  
“Yes. I’m sure of it. Everyone is against me because I can’t keep my goddamn mouth shut, hey, surprising news, right?” Kitty laughs bitterly, swiping away her tears with the back of her hand. “I only told her those awful things to keep her from going away from me, you know? And those are exactly the things that made her run off.”  
  
Kurt rises from the table and comes over to Kitty, and it’s a testament to exactly how much pain she’s in that she lets herself be held.  
  
-  
  
Blaine stopped going to the stables after that night with Kurt, but there’s a new stablehand and Chandler is positive that he and Blaine will hit it off.  
  
At his tutor’s insistence, he goes. Maple and Margaret and the kittens crowd him at the door, but Mabel turns up her nose and stalks off when he offers her a rub. Her rejection hurts more than it should, especially because she’s a cat and they aren’t known for being the most consistent creatures, but he feels for whatever reason like it’s more purposeful than that.  
  
A head of blond catches his attention, because Jake and Ryder both have relatively dark hair, and because the body beneath it is pale enough to be Kurt’s.  
  
It isn’t, of course. It’s Sam, and his eyes are also blue and check him out shamelessly as Kurt’s had that first day, and he’s well muscled and—  
  
A sub.  
  
Sam is a friend to him nonetheless, they both have a nerdy side that they only show around each other, and even though he can’t give Blaine what Kurt could, Blaine finds himself attracted to him anyway.  
  
(He still dreams of Kurt’s voice and hands and body hot on top of his, but he knows that’s not an option anymore.)  
  
They go on rides together even though Blaine can’t ride a horse to save his life. On his birthday he ends up on the horse anyway, arms wrapped around Sam’s waist, laughing his ass off as the wind rushes around them. They tumble from the horse’s back and Sam ties it to a tree before leading Blaine to a clearing and offering him an apple. Blaine doesn’t take the apple, he leans forward and take’s Sam’s lips between his, and it’s barely a kiss before Sam is pulling away, eyes shocked and round.  
  
“Hey, man, uh, you’re really cool and stuff, but—uh, I’m, really, not—”  
  
“I know we’re both subs, just, please, let me—” Blaine tries to kiss him again, more desperate this time, and Sam literally shoves him back. Blaine trips over a tree root and lands on his butt in the grass, staring up at his friend in confusion.  
  
“Sorry about that, man, I, uh—it’s not the sub thing,” Sam says, scratching the back of his neck awkwardly. “I’m just—I dig chicks, y’know? I’m not, uh, not into the whole guy thing.”  
  
Blaine’s face goes red. Oh.  
  
“We can still be friends,” Sam offers when Blaine doesn’t say anything. “Like, bros, right? Brothers? I don’t have a problem with the, uh, guys-who-prefer-guys thing. I’m just—not into that.”  
  
“No, no, I get it,” Blaine says, clenching his jaw tight. He refuses to cry in front of Sam. “I just think—you should go, now.”  
  
“But, I mean, we only have one horse!” Sam protests, but Blaine waves his hand.  
  
“This is a royal command, or whatever, just, go back to the palace. Don’t worry about me.”  
  
“Um, if you say so, man,” Sam says, and Blaine can breathe properly once he’s disappeared into the trees.  
  
He gets up and walks for a little while in the direction opposite the one Sam went, finds a river and spends some time skipping stones over its surface. He’s not very good at it, the most he gets is three skips before the stone vanishes under the water, but he keeps at it before he realizes the sun is sinking between the trees and he really doesn’t have another way to get back to the palace.  
  
And then it hits him, really hits him, that today is his birthday, and he’s all alone.  
  
He’s cold and afraid and he figures maybe he’ll walk along the riverbank until his surroundings look familiar, but it’s getting dark fast and he has no idea where he’s going and all the trees look the same. Rustling branches and twigs cracking in the brush around him have him walking fast, crazed with the notion that something is following him, and then he sees a path on the side of him that isn’t the river, and a horse and rider are coming toward him at an alarming speed.  
  
He can’t veer to the right because he’ll fall into the river, but any more to the left has him in the horse’s direct path. Frantically, he tries to make himself as small as possible, there’s a possibility the rider won’t see him because the horse is moving so fast, anyway, and then—  
  
“Blaine?”  
  
Oh gods, gods, gods—  
  
Kurt dismounts from the horse as smoothly as he had the first time Blaine had ever seen him, and his brown hair is windswept and tousled from its usual coif, but his eyes are full of concern and more than ever, Blaine wants to kneel.  
  
“What are you doing out so late, honey?” Kurt says, taking off his riding cape and putting it around Blaine’s shoulders with so much care Blaine could cry. “Are you alright?”  
  
Blaine feels himself fall before he can catch himself, his legs buckle under him and he’s on his knees in front of Kurt for the third time in his life and for the third time in his life feels perfectly safe despite the circumstances about him.  
  
Kurt crouches, not on his knees but at eye level with Blaine, and fastens the clasp of his cape around him so it won’t fall off. “Blaine, sweetheart, please say something. You’re scaring me.”  
  
Blaine blinks rapidly, bites his lip, opens his mouth. The first word that rushes out unprompted is “Sir.”  
  
Kurt’s hands are on his wrists so fast Blaine can’t think. “Blaine, tell me what’s wrong.” An order. Blaine’s breath comes a little easier for it.  
  
He explains, sentences tripping over each other, of Sam and the apple and the kiss—  
  
“Wait, it’s your birthday?” Kurt says, cutting Blaine off with a sad look on his face. “Oh, I’m sorry, baby.”  
  
At that name something breaks in Blaine’s chest: he folds over onto himself and begins to sob. “Shh, shh, it’s alright, you’re okay,” Kurt chants into Blaine’s shoulder as he wraps his arms around him and sits next to Blaine, pulling him onto his lap. “You’re okay, baby, you’re okay,” Kurt says, and Blaine looks at him through clumped-up eyelashes.  
  
“He was my first kiss,” he chokes out. “My first kiss—he didn’t kiss me back, Kurt—”  
  
Kurt’s mouth is on his and nothing else matters. He kisses Blaine so deeply Blaine could and does lose himself in it, and Blaine opens his mouth so that Kurt’s tongue can meet his. Kurt pulls back gently, resting his forehead against Blaine’s, and Blaine pouts at the loss.  
  
“Come back—”  
  
“You needed to breathe, baby,” Kurt says, smiling at Blaine’s confusion. He draws a fingertip over Blaine’s lips, rubs it over his wet eyes, and kisses Blaine again, gentle and chaste.  
  
“I like when—” Blaine blushes crimson, avoids Kurt’s curious eyes. “Never mind.”  
  
“You like when?” Kurt prompts, and wraps a strong arm around Blaine’s waist.  
  
“When you call me that,” Blaine whispers, barely able to say it aloud.  
  
“When I call you what?” Kurt says, a tease, and Blaine flushes darker.  
  
“You know,” he says, and Kurt grins.  
  
“Tell me.” A command. Blaine sags in his arms.  
  
“No fair.”  
  
“Tell me what you like me to call you,” Kurt says, brushing his lips over the shell of Blaine’s ear.  
  
“Baby.” The word is hardly audible, but Blaine feels his neck grow warm regardless.  
  
“You like that, hmm?” Kurt tugs at Blaine’s ear with his teeth, moves down to suck a hard kiss into his jaw. Blaine whines. “Oh, you do. Naughty boy,” he purrs against Blaine’s neck, licking the tendons there. Blaine feels his cock jerk against Kurt’s stomach, and Kurt pushes Blaine back, spreading his legs and settling between them on the cold packed dirt of the ground. “Want your shirt off, baby?” He doesn’t wait for an answer, pulls it over Blaine’s head without undoing the buttons, and moves from his neck to his collarbone, sucking harshly at the skin there. Blaine moans, can’t help it, as one of Kurt’s hands pinches his nipple. His hips jerk up and Kurt’s mouth bruises into his skin.  
  
“S-sorry, Sir,” Blaine says, trying to keep his hips down, but Kurt just laughs.  
  
“Move as much as you need to, baby, but don’t come till I say you can.”  
  
Blaine complies, and Kurt’s mouth works its way down to his check, where he takes a nipple into his mouth. Blaine gasps loudly. “Oh gods, Kurt, please, please—” Kurt’s tongue swirls against the tiny nub and then releases it, blowing cold air on his chest and causing his nipple to stiffen. “Oh,” Blaine whines, moving his hips up against where he can feel Kurt’s cock beginning to stiffen through his trousers. “Kurt, Kurt—” Kurt licks a wet stripe over his sternum and then noses his belly gently. Blaine tenses his muscles involuntarily, self consciously, trying to flatten his stomach, but Kurt removes his mouth entirely at this.  
  
“Relax, baby. You need to relax or I’m going to stop all of this and you won’t get to come.” Blaine reluctantly unclenches his muscles, suddenly hating the way his belly sticks out from the rest of his body, and then forgetting all about it when Kurt bites at the curve of his stomach sharply. He kisses the hairiness of Blaine’s belly, an apology, then laves it with his tongue thoroughly, making Blaine inhale at the almost ticklish sensation.  
  
“Gods, if you keep doing that—”  
  
“Shhh. I know, okay? Tell me when you’re close.”  
  
“Close?”  
  
“To coming.”  
  
“Coming?”  
  
“Remember when you got your sickness?” Gods, how could Blaine forget? “When you come, your cock produces the sticky fluid that gets all over you. That’s your semen, your seed. Your come,” Kurt explains patiently. He looks up to make sure Blaine nods in comprehension before he ducks his head down and runs his tongue over Blaine’s hipbones.  
  
“Your waist is so little,” Kurt breathes, squeezing Blaine’s hips with both hands. “How it would look in a vest when you get older, gods.” His hands linger at the top of Blaine’s breeches. “Can I take these off, baby?”  
  
“Please,” Blaine squeaks when Kurt drags his mouth over the bulge of his cock, sucking at it through the fabric.  
  
“I’m going to go down on you,” Kurt says quietly. “Take your cock into my mouth. Is that okay?”  
  
“Anything, anything you want,” Blaine says, panting, writhing with desperation.  
  
Kurt unlaces his trousers, takes out his cock—Blaine trembles at the cold air on his exposed body for just seconds before Kurt sinks his mouth over the head and then slowly takes more and more of the shaft into his mouth. He feels himself hit the back of Kurt’s throat and resists the urge to buck wildly, afraid to choke him.  
  
Kurt’s fist closes around the base of his cock tight, making Blaine’s balls clench up. “Hips still for this, okay?” Kurt hollows his cheeks around Blaine’s cock and hums gently. Blaine whimpers at the vibrations, then utters a swear he never thought he’d say when Kurt’s tongue wraps around his length and Kurt begins to move his head up and down, encasing Blaine’s cock in tight wet heat.  
  
“Gods,” he manages, “gods, Kurt, I’m—I’m close.” Kurt releases his cock from his mouth and puts a hand on either of Blaine’s thighs, spreading them as wide as he can go. He gets a thumb in between Blaine’s cheeks and Blaine screams, so grateful that they are not on palace grounds as he surely would’ve awoken at least half the people. He reddens when Kurt circles a finger around his hole.  
  
“I—Kurt, I can’t—”  
  
“Too much?” The finger is gone, but now one is underneath the sensitive skin of Blaine’s balls, massaging the thin skin there gently. Blaine can’t stop the whimpers falling from his lips, every time Kurt presses particularly hard he feels his balls seize together, and Kurt’s free hand is resting on his cock, not applying pressure, just enough weight for it to ache.  
  
“You’re so beautiful,” Kurt says to the inside of Blaine’s thigh. “Gorgeous.” He presses a kiss where Blaine’s thigh creases into his hip, sucks a mark into the hairy skin. The fingers under Blaine’s balls press upward carefully, making him sigh. “No one will ever touch you here as I have,” he continues, the pad of his thumb rubbing across Blaine’s hole lightly. “No one has ever touched you like this as I am. You’re all mine.” It’s not a question, and that goes straight to Blaine’s cock. He feels the rush surging through him and then the world goes brilliant white, the fluid Kurt had called come spurting frantically from his twitching cock. Kurt slides up his body to mouth the white lines of it from Blaine’s chest, slowing when Blaine’s cock stiffens against his stomach and throbs with a valiant attempt to harden again. He licks at the semen-sticky head of Blaine’s softening length, pulling it into his mouth and releasing it with a lewd pop that makes Blaine whine.  
  
“Please, please—”  
  
“What do you need, beautiful?” Kurt says, licking the last of the come from Blaine’s belly and pulling Blaine’s head to the crook of his neck.  
  
“Kiss me, please—”  
  
Kurt ducks his head and presses his lips to Blaine’s. Blaine’s hand finds his jaw and attempts to pull him even closer, and then he feels Kurt’s cock pressing his thigh. Before Kurt can pull away Blaine puts a hand to where he’s tenting his breeches, and Kurt stutters a moan against his lips.  
  
“B-Blaine, gods, you can’t—”  
  
“You have made me feel so good,” Blaine replies, fumbling to undo the laces of Kurt’s trousers in the dark. “It would be dishonorable of me to not return the favor.”  
  
Kurt’s voice is lower than he’s ever heard it when he wraps his hand clumsily around his cock, and he places his hand over Blaine’s, guiding him through long strokes of his length.  
  
“You’re big,” Blaine whines as Kurt’s cock stands fully against his stomach. “One day—if—if you would have me, I would let you take me—your cock inside of me—”  
  
Kurt moans deep and rough, jerking his cock faster over Blaine’s fist. “Gods, Blaine, the things I would do to you—”  
  
“Sir,” Blaine says, voice breaking, and Kurt comes with a long keen, twitching in Blaine’s hand spasmodically as his fluid spurts between them.  
  
There is a silence as quiet as the woods will allow as Kurt wraps his arms around Blaine and kisses him soft and pliant underneath him. Blaine pulls Kurt as close as he can to his body and inhales his scent of oat and vanilla, and thinks of something Kurt once had told him.  
  
“You said,” Blaine starts, and then bites his lip as he tries to phrase the words correctly. “You said, on the night when you took my first from me—you wanted to, to wreck me?”  
  
Kurt strokes a thumb over Blaine’s collarbone, presses lightly where he had sucked a mark to the thin skin. “If you would let me, if I would let myself, the things I would do to you.”  
  
Blaine shivers, curling into the broadness of Kurt’s chest. “But that word you used. The, uh—wreck. What do you mean by that?”  
  
He feels Kurt’s smile against his forehead. “You are incredibly proper—so put together, the polite mannerisms you have—would that this was a proper relationship, I would make you filthy with desire.”  
  
Blaine furrows his brow, trying to understand. “I know not what you mean—I desire you so, with my whole being, how could I want you more? How would you make me—filthy?”  
  
“Gods, you’re so innocent—” Kurt breaks off, a growl rumbling through his chest that seems more frustration than arousal. “I could show you exactly what I mean, and I fear we’d then draw more suspicion with you limping about for days.”  
  
Blaine yawns loudly, and then bolts fully awake in shock. “They must be looking for me—Kurt, I’d told Sam I’d get home on my own, the anxieties they must be going through—”  
  
Kurt mutters something unintelligible to Blaine’s hair. “I will take you back to the palace—say that I found you in the woods, as I did, on my journey from my country home, and that I took you back to the palace immediately, wrapping you in my own cloak from the cold.”  
  
“Will they not suspect something?”  
  
“No, we can say you were asleep on the side of the road, I thought you an animal of some sort, then realized that it was you and took you home immediately. They know not the time I departed from the country, the time we spent here together will be concealed well.”  
  
Blaine considers this and then murmurs approval. “But Kurt—I would say that if we should not depart for the palace immediately, at least let me be held in your arms as long as I can.”  
  
Kurt draws Blaine impossibly tighter to his being and situates himself on top of Blaine’s body fully. “Happy birthday, baby,” he says, pressing gentle lips to Blaine’s temple as he had the night Blaine’s sickness had he treated. “Dress yourself and I will as well: I do want to get you to the palace by morning.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> in the next chapter some actual plotlike things will occur. chandler is kind of a dick, but only kind of, because i don't like annoying!chandler fics. hope you guys have a nice porn-filled thanksgiving this week and thanks for reading <3


	4. chapter three

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> this chapter doesn't have sex and i do apologize (though the first few paragraphs are just kurt ogling blaine, and, well, can you blame him?). instead there are vaguely plot-shaped things and lots of dialogue. but hey, samcedes makes an appearance, as well as cooper. warnings for chandler being a bit of a dick, but all will be explained.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> happy thanksgiving! this fic will continue to update as usual despite this chapter, which means that you'll be getting another update either saturday or sunday as usual.

The safest way to travel two to a horse when Blaine is half asleep and keeps shifting his weight atop Beth irrationally (“Your fault,” he had informed Kurt happily, “because any way I sit I feel the marks you left in my thighs”) is with Blaine slumbering against Beth’s neck, one of Kurt’s arms around his waist, the other holding the reins. It is safe, yes, but incredibly inconvenient, because though two layers of breeches and a cape rest between Kurt’s cock and Blaine’s ass, Kurt still cannot help growing steadily more aroused with every bump in the road that sends him jolting closer to Blaine’s body.

He thought by the time the sun came up he would surely have been fully erect, bracing his cock against the tiny taper of Blaine’s waist and the thick flare of his ass, and to avoid any awkward explanations as he entered the palace, slows Beth to a trot and adjusts Blaine’s sleeping form so that his legs are on one side of the horse and his ass on the other. It curbs the arousal quite well, however, it leaves Kurt with no other place to stare fondly than the shadowy fan of Blaine’s long eyelashes over his freckled cheeks, and the tiny jut of his Adam’s apple against the stark line of his throat, and the way his curls spill from their gelled confinements and run wild over his forehead and neck. Okay, so he could’ve stared at the trees surrounding them or at Beth’s unruly mane, which he soon needs to wash and comb, but he reasons to himself that neither are so directly in his line of sight as the small form of the prince against the horse’s neck.

And gods, Blaine is small. His hips are irresistibly tiny and only highlight the broad curve of his stomach over his pelvis and how his ass thickens pert and round from his thighs. Draped in Kurt’s cloak, which was more a blanket over his body than anything, he looks adorably little, and the fact that Kurt has debauched this boy more than once is not lost on him. But another fact that Kurt has tried and failed to keep from his thoughts is that of Blaine’s sixteenth birthday, the fact that the prince is now perfectly legal, and, despite his small stature, assuredly a man by law. (The minor detail that Kurt is four years his senior nags the back of his mind, but this he is much more successful in ignoring.)

By law, Blaine can now make his own choice as to who would dominate him regularly. Cooper only would’ve been eligible for the first year of his sicknesses, and then Blaine could see for himself who was a fitting dom. The issue stands thus: the dominant still needs to be of royal blood, and no doubt suitors would be lining up around the palace as soon as word got out of the legal submissive prince. Kurt knows of the Smythes in the north, the Crawfords in the east, and the Claringtons of the south—the Andersons owned the westernmost kingdom in the land. Prince Sebastian would be the obvious choice, as he comes from a long and prestigious line of royal dominants. Kurt is unsure whether Prince Adam is dominant or submissive, but Prince Hunter is most definitely the former. However, Hunter has long claimed to have no interest at all in the male form, leaving it between Sebastian and Adam for Blaine to choose from.

He is brought from his thoughts as the sun bleeds purple and orange over the sky, highlighting the palace tall against the horizon. As he draws closer to the palace gates, he notices Chandler standing in front of the drawbridge, arms folded over his chest. He stops Beth and dismounts her carefully, making sure Blaine was still snoring and not in danger of falling off.

“Chandler!” he calls, getting merely a raised eyebrow in return. _Fuck_. “How have things been?”

“The prince has been missing since yesterday afternoon,” Chandler says, voice unnaturally measured, “and is now arriving on your horse, covered in your cloak? You’d better have a good reason for this. Prince Cooper is livid.”

“I found him cold and shivering in the forest when I was on my way back from the country,” Kurt retorts. “I was afraid he’d catch something so I put my cloak over him and put him on my horse for a quick ride back to the palace. He’s been asleep nearly the whole time.”

Chandler stares at him, expression unreadable. “Have you been fucking him?”

“What?” Kurt splutters, taking a step back. “Absolutely not—”

“The night before he disappeared,” Chandler says calmly, “I heard noises coming from his room. I had to make sure he wasn’t hurt. But as soon as I opened the door all I saw was him thrashing about on his bed. His cock was erect and he was on all fours, kept pushing his ass up just to slump back down on his bed. This is normal for sub sickness, of course. Here’s the thing, Kurt. He was moaning your name.”

Kurt swallows hard around a sudden block in his throat. “And from this you draw that I must be fucking him? Not that he perhaps has some sort of crush on me and is using my image to sustain his fantasies, nothing more?”

Chandler shakes his head. “You don’t understand. You haven’t studied these things to teach, as I have. The first bout of sub sickness, the submissive will collapse and kneel, cock erect. But it is only during the second bout that he will try and expose himself, to try to fuck himself back onto something that is not there. So here is my question, Kurt: who helped him through that first rush? I have consulted Cooper, and he says he didn’t even know the sickness had started. Kurt,” Chandler says, fixing him with a hard stare, “he was moaning _your name_.”

Kurt is trembling like an autumn leaf in wind. “Chandler,” he whispers, “how am I to explain—that he was at the stables when it first happened, that he was begging for release—Cooper is drawn to women, and would not know how to help his brother—”

Chandler rubs his palm over his forehead. “So you admit it, then.”

“What was I supposed to do?” Kurt says helplessly. He closes and then opens his eyes, exhaling loudly. “The way he was looking at me—Chandler—”

“Gods, gods, I cannot believe this,” Chandler says—why does he sound _angry_? “You care about him.”

“Don’t be ridiculous—”

“You do! You do, and you know perfectly well that now he is of legal age to take a suitor of _royal_ _blood_ , Kurt. It won’t work out, there’s no way it can—”

“You tell me things I already know,” Kurt says sorrowfully. “But what’s done has been done. Yes, I have taken his first, and let Cooper forbid him from the stables and barn as he pleases, but please, please let me keep my job.”

“That’s what you care about? Through all of this—you only care of your pay here, that you have a roof over your head and money in your pocket? You care not one bit for Blaine, then?”

“You’re putting words in my mouth. I refuse to go back to the country, Chandler, not because I so care for the city, but because I cannot bear to be apart from Blaine.”

Chandler rubs his palm against his brow again. “You won’t even get to see him.”

“No, he will be forbade from seeing me. It is selfishness that I want to stay at the palace, but not for want of riches. Chandler, please, you have to convince Cooper to let me stay.”

The guard’s face softens. “Fine. Fine, but I will not tell him you stay for Blaine. Is that fair?”

“Enough,” says Kurt, and it is then he hears a drowsy voice from behind him.

“Sir?” Blaine says, voice small and confused. “Where are you?”

With a harried look at Chandler, Kurt strides to the horse and slides Blaine from her back. “I know you’re tired, your majesty, but you must stand on your own. We’ve reached the palace.”

“Oh,” Blaine says, and then blinks when he sees Chandler frowning behind them. “Oh, of course.” He straightens himself and unclasps the cloak from his neck, but Kurt shakes his head.

“No, do keep that on. You were in the cold of the forest for a very long time—I do not wish for you to fall ill.”

“Sorry,” Blaine says, and then his whole body shudders—not with sub sickness, but with cold. Kurt smiles gently at him.

“See? Your hands are frightfully frozen. Chandler will take you to your room, and I will to the kitchens to see if they can make something warm for you.” Blaine nods and addresses Chandler cordially.

“I’m sorry the worry I must have caused,” he says with a self-deprecating smile. “I fell asleep in the forest at the side of the road. Would that Kurt had not come back on the same road I would be there still.”

Chandler nods sharply, leaving Kurt with a final glance before he takes Blaine’s arm and leads him to the palace.

-

Upon entering the kitchen, Kurt finds only two other people within—the new hand, Sam, and one of the cooks, Mercedes. They are occupied at first—but as soon as Kurt clears his throat, they spring from the other’s embrace and have the grace to blush.

“The prince has returned from where you left him,” says Kurt to Sam, trying and probably failing to not let his gaze turn to a glare.

“Hey, man, he told me to go, and I was like, well, there’s only one horse, so—”

“You, who know the forest like your childhood quarters, decided to ride back and leave him alone?”

“Look, sorry, but he can’t ride to save his life. And why are you so wound up about it, anyway?” Sam’s eyes turn curious.

“I do not wish the prince to fall ill,” Kurt says shortly. “Especially given that one sickness is already upon him.”

“Oh, Sam had his a few months ago,” Mercedes speaks up. She smiles widely at Kurt, who finds himself smiling back in spite of himself. “I had to help with that, of course.” She nudges Sam’s shoulder with her own, and he grins dopily at her.

“Thank the gods it only lasts a few weeks,” Sam says, then seems to remember who he’s talking to. “But uh, man, what’d you come in here for in the first place? I mean, no one knows I’m in here ‘cept ‘Cedes, so I don’t think it was for me?”

“Oh yes,” Kurt says, turning his attention fully to Mercedes. “I was wondering if you could make some soup or tea or something for Blaine. He’s got the beginnings of a cold from spending all night in the woods.”

“Sure, I’ll make something and Sam will bring it right up in a few minutes,” Mercedes says cheerfully. “Chicken broth with vegetables has been his favorite ever since I’ve started cooking here. And maybe some cocoa to drink with it?” She nods absentmindedly, pulling a metal pot from an open cabinet and tapping Sam’s side with a finger. “Could you get the vegetables from the ice box, hon? Oh—and the chocolate from the pantry.

 When Sam disappears, she leans against the countertop and looks at Kurt thoughtfully. “You said the prince’s got his sub sickness. But Prince Cooper didn’t know about that—I overheard him talking to Chandler, Blaine’s tutor. So how is it that you know when Blaine’s own blood didn’t?”

Kurt flushes—damned pale skin giving everything away.

“Oh,” she says, eyes dancing with mirth. “It’s like that, mm?”

“I could lose my job here,” Kurt says quietly. “And where would I go? I can’t bear to be away from—you know. He’ll have suitors lining the halls soon enough, but—”

Mercedes’ round brown eyes turn serious. “You got it bad, boy. And he’s in the midst of his sickness, so you don’t know how he really feels, right?”

“How did you—”

“Same way when I first met Sam,” Mercedes says, filling the metal pot with water and lighting the fire in the stove. “He was horny as hell—honestly, I thought he preferred men, but then we started doing—well, you don’t need nasty details. Haven’t let us go all the way, either. Saving that for marriage,” she confides. “Anyway, point is, I had no idea whether he’d want to be with me after the sickness let up. But here’s the thing: if you’re a sub, you and your first dom have a connection, like it or not. And it’s more often the dom who won’t wanna stay with the sub after their sickness is over than the other way around. But your case, it seems like you’re pretty adamant about being with that boy in any way you can. So I’d stick it out. Help him through his sickness—Cooper may be mad as a hopping rabbit right now, but after that wears off he’ll be grateful he don’t have to jerk his brother every few nights.” Mercedes throws him a wink. “They don’t come straighter than Prince Cooper, I’ll say. So he’ll probably let you, mm, be intimate with Prince Blaine a little more. Now the prince is legal, you’re right, suitors are all gonna want a piece of that. But in the end it’s Blaine’s decision. I think it comes down to you or Prince Sebastian in the north.”

“But I’m a slave—he doesn’t have a choice, does he?”

“Look, sweetie, I know there aren’t a lot of happy endings between slaves with royals, right? But that boy’s got a good head on his shoulders. No one’s really running the kingdom right now: Cooper’s still dealing with legal issues because he don’t wanna rule this place, Blaine dealing with emotional issues because of his sickness and because his father was so damned prejudiced against subs. Well, his father ain’t around to influence Cooper anymore. And Cooper sure knows he’s no good to run the kingdom. With Blaine legally a man now, I figure it won’t be long till he realizes why his dad didn’t want him in charge of the nation, and till he takes over completely from Cooper.”

“You really think so?” Kurt says, breathy with hope. His eyes have been filling up and he’s just now noticed. “Chandler says he and the other tutors have nothing but praise for Blaine—he’s intelligent as they come, they say, and has common sense on his shoulders. He knows how to carry responsibility.”

“I’ll pray for you,” Mercedes says, taking the vegetables from Sam as he emerges from the cellar. It’s a sweet sentiment—one that Kurt hasn’t heard since his dad passed, and he doesn’t bother telling her that for all the gods have given him, he still can’t quite believe that, if they do exist, they would care to dabble in the lives of mortals. “Thanks, darlin.’” She pecks Sam on the cheek and adds the veggies into the now-boiling water. “You’re welcome to sit and relax while the food’s cookin,’” she adds to Kurt. “I feel you need some more time to think things over before you see the prince again.”

Kurt nods gratefully. His head is dizzied with information that Mercedes has bestowed upon him, and he’d hate to spill everything to Blaine the moment their eyes met again.

-

Blaine, as it happens, is huddled under his blankets listening to Chandler and Cooper take turns yelling at him.

“Do you know how dangerous it was for you to stay out there alone in the forest?” Cooper says, turning his head sharply to look at Blaine.

“And in the midst of his sickness, no less,” Chandler says, “if he’d been found in a bout of submission, who would’ve taken care of him? Or worse, who could’ve taken advantage of him?”

“Well the gods bade Kurt found me,” Blaine argues stubbornly. “And the danger has past. I feel that this experience will be one from which I learn and am humbled by, lest you rather a different outcome.”

Cooper finally stops pacing and sits on the bed next to Blaine. “Chandler, a moment.” The guard turns curtly out of the room with no last glance for Blaine, and then he is alone with his brother.

There is a still quiet between them—not quite tension, but something. Cooper’s face is contorted in a strange way that Blaine has only seen on him a few times before, the way that means he is actually putting proper thought to his head before he speaks. And then he clears his throat, and attempts a weak smile at his younger brother, who looks at him bemusedly.

“You feel safe with Kurt?” is the last question he expects to hear from his brother at this time, but it is the one that Cooper asks.

“Yes,” Blaine says, too caught off guard to give anything but the truth. “Absolutely so.”

“Chandler and I spoke before we came up to your room, Blainey,” Cooper says, gnawing his teeth along his bottom lip. “Chandler says you’ve had at least two bouts of the sub sickness. And he claims Kurt has—uh—helped you, through at least one.”

Blaine bows his head.

“You won’t get in trouble for telling me the truth,” Cooper says, something gentle falling over his face. “I promise.”

“But will Kurt?” Blaine says before he can stop himself. “I mean—I don’t—”

Cooper is looking at him thoughtfully, which on his face looks like someone is twisting his intestines. “Chandler says subs will have a connection with the dominant who takes from them their first, like it or not. That’s why I was supposed to—we are already connected by blood, so it makes things less awkward when time comes for a suitor. I’m—sorry, if this is too personal, but I must ask. Has Kurt touched your mark?”

Blaine shudders involuntarily, thinks of the hollowed-circle mark on his left shoulderblade. “No.” Which is true—Kurt has never touched his mark, not purposefully and not without layers of clothing between them. In fact, Blaine realizes, Kurt has never bared Blaine’s back to him completely. All the times they had been intimate it was face to face, never anything else.

Cooper nods. “I believe you. And I believe—this is not easy for me to do, but I believe I will let Kurt stay here at the palace. And—” he holds up a hand as tears spring to Blaine’s eyes, sudden and bright—“I certainly will not keep the two of you apart. Honestly you know I do not want to—uh, be with you, the way that Kurt is now. But bear this in mind: as of yesterday you are by the law a man. There are two prominently homosexual dominant suitors that will be courting you, Prince Sebastian of the Smythes of the north, and Prince Adam of the Crawfords of the east. I’ve sent for them to arrive tomorrow. They will be—mm—competing, sort of, for your hand.”

“In marriage?” Blaine draws back from his brother unconsciously. “Competing?”

“Not an actual competition, Blainey, how much time do you think I have on my hands? Don't answer that. Really, though, it’s just a matter of who you feel is better suited to you. There’s only one option that’s out.” Cooper waggles his eyebrows ludicrously. “You can’t have both.”

Blaine flushes despite himself. “Cooper!”

“Sorry, lil bro, couldn’t resist. And you also can’t have neither, unless they both die or something. Don’t get ideas from that. You’re choosing one or the other, like it or not.” Cooper rises from the bed and pats Blaine’s curls patronizingly. “So sleep on it, and for god’s sake, take a bath. I don’t know what you and Kurt were doing in the forest, but you reek of semen.”


	5. chapter four

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> yay, sex-resembling things occur in this chapter! but, with great sex comes great plot...... and adam and sebastian come into play here, so if you don't like them i'm sorry. they're not too terrible, the most they do is get in the way of the klaine. warning for a non-consensual kiss (SPOILER ALERT: between sebastian and blaine). but all will be resolved in the next chapter, and there is a reason for everything. oh! and there's a very important author's note at the end, please please please read it. but now, on to the story.

Kurt taps the door of Blaine’s bedroom with his foot, pushing it open when he hears no objection from within. He sets the soup and cocoa on Blaine’s side table carefully and shuts the door softly.  
  
“You don’t have to be quiet. I’m not asleep,” Blaine’s sleep-slurred voice says from the bed. “You brought soup?”  
  
“And hot cocoa, at Mercedes’ insistence,” Kurt replies, smoothing a hand over Blaine’s hair. “Cooper caught me on my way up here and said to make sure you take a bath before you fall asleep.”  
  
Blaine makes a noncommittal grunt. “He said I smelled of semen.”  
  
Kurt snorts. “Well, that would be my fault, then. Would you like me to help wash it from you?” He stops himself. “I’m sorry. Only if you allow me I would gladly assist you in your bath.”  
  
“I know how to wash myself, Kurt,” Blaine says, sitting up on his elbows to look Kurt in the eye. He smiles, eyelashes fluttering. “But gods, I am tired. It might be good you help me to not fall aslumber in the tub. And also,” he says, cheeks coloring as he determinedly avoids Kurt’s gaze, “you could ensure that I am washed, um, thoroughly?”  
  
“Would you eat first, then, so that your soup and drink would not grow cold?” Kurt says, pressing a hand to Blaine’s cheek. It’s warmer than it was when they first arrived at the palace, but he still fears for his prince’s health. Blaine turns his head, kisses Kurt’s palm.  
  
“You are good to me. Better than I deserve, really.”  
  
“Nonsense!” Kurt says, ignoring the way his hand tingles where Blaine’s lips had touched it. “I’ll feed it to you myself if I have to.”  
  
Blaine’s eyes dart from his face again, and Kurt feels his face go warm where his hand is still cradling it.  
  
“You want that?” Kurt teases, lowering his voice. “Would that I knew feeding you would win you over, I would’ve done it ages ago.” He takes the soup from the table and ladles some into the spoon. “Open.” But Blaine shakes his head, eyes dancing.  
  
“I will have it after my bath,” he says decisively. “Though it will be cold. I am afraid if you feed it to me I will not leave this bed till you have had me in it.” His face warms again, and Kurt sets down the spoon and takes Blaine’s head in both his hands, kissing him soundly.  
  
“As you wish,” he says, smiling into Blaine’s mouth as the prince whines into his. “Undress, then, and I will see how quickly I can draw a bath.”  
  
-  
  
The water of the bath is warm and steamy when Kurt puts his finger in to check. And then he feels Blaine walk into the bathing room behind him and turns to find the boy completely naked from head to toe.  
  
“Gods,” Kurt breathes, with Blaine’s face and neck turning a lovely shade of pink, he can’t think of anything else to say.  
  
“I had hoped,” Blaine says, shyly toeing the rug at the side of the tub, “that you would join me? Conserve, mm, the water?” Kurt is out of his clothes before Blaine has finished speaking.  
  
“Come here, baby,” he says, smiling at the way Blaine’s cock jerks at the word. “Let me take care of you.”  
  
He props himself at the end of the tub and situates Blaine between his legs, first massaging bathing oils to his head and washing the clumps of gel from loose strands of curls. His cock is hard against his leg as Blaine shifts closer to him, his back pressing into Kurt’s front, but he ignores it in favor of drawing moans from Blaine’s mouth as he digs his fingers into his scalp.  
  
“Has anyone ever told you how incredibly beautiful you are?” Kurt murmurs into Blaine’s shoulder. Blaine smiles.  
  
“No one who meant it the same way you do,” he says honestly.  
  
“But soon there will be two who will,” Kurt says, feeling a twinge of jealousy run through him. “Prince Sebastian and Prince Adam—”  
  
“Kurt,” Blaine interrupts, threading his fingers through Kurt’s own, “I do not want to talk about those two until they arrive tomorrow morn at the palace. As I have my time with only you, please let me enjoy it.”  
  
“I’m sorry,” Kurt says, untangling a knot of hair at the nape of Blaine’s neck and feeling pleased as Blaine makes a happy, relaxed noise at it. “My attention returns to where you most enjoy it: on yourself.”  
  
Blaine laughs softly. “You make me a vain man, though I doubt I’d like it any other way.” Kurt responds by sucking a dark bruise into Blaine’s shoulder, is rewarded by hearing him cry out and feeling him settle back against Kurt’s chest.  
  
“I think I’ve finally freed your curls from that awful gel,” Kurt notes, carding his fingers through Blaine’s hair, made soft by the water. Blaine makes an indignant sound.  
  
“I like that gel! It makes them look controlled. The curls look ridiculous without it.”  
  
“Mmm-hmm, that’s what you think.” Kurt grabs a bar of soap from the edge of the tub and begins working it between his fingers.  
  
“You haven’t seen them free of the gel and dry,” Blaine says. “I look like I’m wearing a wig of blackened broccoli.” Kurt chuckles.  
  
“I refuse to believe that that would look any less handsome on you,” he informs Blaine, rubbing the soapsuds into his arms.  
  
He lathers Blaine’s curly-haired chest with suds, then drags the bar of soap down the soft bulge of his stomach and over his half-hard cock. Blaine whimpers loudly and squeezes Kurt’s hand where he’s been holding it at the bottom of the tub. But he lets Kurt rub his sensitive thighs in soap (possessive heat stirs in Kurt’s chest when he sees the purpling bruises there left by his mouth) and then his knees (the backs of which Kurt finds delightfully ticklish) and calves. Kurt washes the soles of Blaine’s feet and then slides the soap bar from his ankles to his shins to the backs of his thighs, and then pauses before lathering Blaine’s cock and balls in suds. It would look comical if Blaine hadn’t gotten so desperately hard as he’d done it. The curve of his cock thrashes against his abdomen, and little moans keep falling from his lips.  
  
“Kurt—Kurt, please, Kurt, please, please—”  
  
The pad of Kurt’s index finger is so wet that when he ghosts it over Blaine’s rim it slips in without him meaning to, and he instantly draws it out and strokes Blaine’s cock instead, hoping that he hadn’t noticed. The way that he had been met with no resistance from Blaine’s hole is going straight to his head, however, and he ‘accidentally’ slips a fingertip back in as he rolls Blaine’s balls in their sac.  
  
Blaine’s eyes roll all the way back in their sockets and then snap shut. “S—sir, gods, please—”  
  
“What do you need, baby?”  
  
“More—your fingers, please—”  
  
Kurt smiles, drawing firm circles over Blaine’s rim and watching his cheeks flush dark red. “Like this?”  
  
“N-no, I want—need them inside, gods—”  
  
He breaches the first ring of muscle easily, Blaine’s anus fluttering around his finger uncontrollably. “Feel good, honey?” He strokes his way deeper into Blaine’s hole, adding another finger and crooking them up, searching. Blaine grabs at the hand that isn’t inside of him, slumps further into Kurt’s chest.  
  
“Oh ohohohoh Kurt, that’s—that’s—”  
  
“Mmhmm,” Kurt hums, finding the sensitive gland with every upward stroke of his fingers. “That’s the spot, right, baby?”  
  
“If you keep doing that,” Blaine says, breathless—“If you keep doing that I’m gonna come, oh gods.” Kurt presses a kiss to his hair.  
  
“Let me wash you first?”  
  
“Gngh,” Blaine responds as Kurt pulls out his fingers and leaves him empty and twitching. “It’s so _loose_ now.”  
  
“Patience,” Kurt says chidingly, rubbing softly over Blaine’s cock. He takes the bar of soap in hand again, runs it over Blaine’s arms and shoulders and back. He slips it between Blaine’s cheeks, teasing, laughing when Blaine lets out an embarrassed grunt.  
  
“ _Kurt_.”  
  
“Okay, okay.” He brings the soap back up, slides it under Blaine’s armpits, making him squirm and giggle. Kurt begins to smooth it over the planes of Blaine’s shoulders before he sees the open circled mark slightly below where Blaine’s left shoulder meets his neck. Blaine feels his hesitance against his naked skin and turns his head back to look at him.

  
“You can touch my mark, you know.”

  
Kurt’s brow furrows, and he looks at the soapy water in dismay. “The first to touch your mark will be the suitor of your choosing, sweetheart.”

  
Blaine shifts between Kurt’s legs. “I—” he begins in protest, but Kurt kisses the words from his mouth.

  
“They will know if I have, believe me,” Kurt whispers against Blaine’s lips. “And I would if there were no obstacles, beautiful. I would. But—”

  
Blaine’s eyelashes flutter soft on his cheekbones. “I understand, sir. I’m sorry.” Kurt’s mouth dips and then twists into a sudden grin.

  
“You’ll have to wear something high-collared tomorrow till these marks fade, baby,” he says, watching Blaine’s cock jolt as he presses his fingers to the bruises on Blaine’s collarbone, harder than he should. “Else I might as well touch your mark now and have your suitors whispering conjecture to each other."

  
Blaine whines. “I like them. I like the reminder that—that I am yours.” Kurt turns Blaine’s face from his, eyes shutting as if he could block his emotions that way.

“They are temporary,” is all he says, speaking as much of the marks on Blaine’s skin as he is of their relationship.

The suitors will come tomorrow, and there is nothing either of them can do about it.

-

Prince Adam arrives first, all wired muscle and tousled blond hair. Kurt watches from the curtained windows of Mercedes’ room, munching the so-called rejects of the peanut brittle she’d been making for the occasion. He radiates dominance as far as the slaves’ quarters, making Kurt’s spine stiffen and Mercedes cluck her tongue sympathetically. Blaine greets him as cordially as Kurt can see, and Kurt sees him bow his head as their eyes meet in a small display of submission that has Kurt’s intestines twisting uncomfortably. Mercedes’ hand rests over the one of his that is not holding brittle and gives him a squeeze.

“He’s a lovely sub,” she says lowly, other hand coming to rest on Kurt’s shoulder. “You did him good.” Kurt shakes his head slightly.

“That was all Chandler’s teaching.”

“And his willingness to learn by the experience you gave him,” she cuts back, but it hurts too much to hope right now.

The two men are talking, and Kurt notes with no small amount of smugness that Adam is slightly shorter than Blaine—something he knows Blaine isn’t drawn to, because Kurt himself has a few inches on the prince that Blaine likes to curl into and—gods. He shouldn’t let himself make comparisons, but he can’t help it, especially as a few minutes later as Sebastian’s carriage pulls into sight, and Sebastian himself emerges.

His hair is styled carefully into a coif similar to Kurt’s, and his skin is almost as pale, and they are built much the same way. Kurt inhales and chomps a piece of peanut brittle loudly. Mercedes gives him an approving nod.

“The only cure to sadness is candy,” she says with wisdom far beyond her years.

“And the only cure to loneliness is cake,” Kurt replies, sinking far into the faded cushions of her armchair.

“Then I’ll pray I won’t be making any cake for you soon.” Mercedes edges her short frame closer to the window. “They’re exchanging pleasantries. Would you like to see for yourself?”

Kurt drags himself from the chair again and watches as Blaine’s head tips lower than it had for Adam. Cooper appears out of nowhere next to him, greeting the other princes and pointed exaggeratedly to various plots of land across the palace grounds.

“I believe he’s letting them know where they’ll be staying,” Mercedes says, pushing back more of the curtain. “Prince Cooper is a fairly big believer in pointing.”

“And turning into stances,” Kurt says. “The fencingmaster, Elliott, informs me that his form is horrendous because he insists on turning before making any other movement.”

Mercedes snorts. “Since when do you and Elliott talk?”

Kurt dips his chin. “Since I decided to make friends around the palace after two years of working here.” Mercedes nods.

“Sam’s new as a baby chick and says that everyone looked too frightening to talk to except me. Of course, I’d already dominated him a few times, so that helped break the ice.” Kurt laughs shortly.

“Have I told you that I’m leaving for another five days?” Mercedes startles and turns to face him.

“This week?”

“Tomorrow, actually.”

“Where to?” She sets him with a puzzled gaze.

“My childhood house in the country,” Kurt explains. “My friends have taken over my original farm and there’s been some relationship drama. I took Ryder and Jake to the palace to avoid that.” He shakes his head. “I guess it’s inevitable.”

“Dom and sub drama, or something else?”

“Is there anything other kind? My best friend’s sub went missing and everyone knows where to except her. She’s rather distraught. I feel the need to comfort her.”

“And to not be around Blaine when his suitors are flirting with him shamelessly,” Mercedes says. It’s not a question, and Kurt feels color flush high on his cheeks.

“It would only make things more difficult for both of us.”

“But his third bout of the sickness is going to come soon,” Mercedes says. “He’s had the first with you, the second in his own bed, and if the suitors are here when his third arrives—”

“Then they’ll take care of it,” Kurt says shortly. “One or the other, just not me.”

Mercedes kisses his cheek suddenly. “However this works out, I will bake you a cake. Just tell me if it’s a happiness cake or a loneliness cake.”

“Believe me, you’ll know.”

-

Adam and Sebastian are both lovely men, and Blaine is grateful for it. Adam is sweet, with a charming accent, and Sebastian would remind him of Kurt in looks if his personality wasn’t so—vulgar.

It’s been two hours, and Adam has chattered on endlessly about how beautiful the palace is to Blaine, with Sebastian on his other side making obscene comments (they mostly have to do with how well Blaine fills out the backside of his breeches and how well-fed he must be, which make Blaine self-conscious as anything) every so often and pinching Blaine’s ass when Adam isn’t looking (which makes Blaine yelp and jump, and makes Sebastian smirk unpleasantly). It’s—it’s a lot to take in, and after this much time, Blaine is ready to go to his room and melt in Kurt’s arms.

Adam leaves him with a gracious smile, but Sebastian follows him up the stairs and when Blaine turns around to dismiss him politely, he’s right there, pressing Blaine to the door.

“So how far are you in your sickness?” he purrs, breath damp and hot over Blaine’s face. “Don’t tell me you haven’t started it, the submission is crawling off of you.”

Blaine feels his eyes go wide and then regains himself. “Prince Sebastian, I’d like to retire to my quarters for right now, if you please.”

Sebastian grins at him, predatory, making his skin crawl. “What if I don’t please?”

“It’s not a—you’ve been treating me disrespectfully for the past few hours, and I’d like some time to myself.”

“Time with your right hand?” Sebastian smirks, inching ever closer into Blaine’s space. “I can give you better than what your brother ever did. Show you what it truly means to be dominated.”

Blaine shuts his eyes, intending it to give him a second of composure, but Sebastian’s lips are on his, and his fingers are pressing Blaine’s wrists against his sides into the wood of his bedroom door. In an instant Blaine spins them around and has their positions reversed, gulping in air as he stares Sebastian down.

“I appreciate the offer, Prince Sebastian, but all I want right now is to be alone.” He grinds his teeth furiously, pushes past Sebastian, and locks the door behind him, chest heaving.

The last thing he hears from Sebastian’s lips is, “Be careful, Prince Blaine. Don’t test me. No one likes a cocky submissive, but believe me, I know how take off your little façade. You’ll give in soon enough.”

-

Blaine waits till he can’t hear Sebastian’s footsteps anymore, then rings the bell for a slave to come so he can ask them to get Kurt. But to his surprise it’s Kurt that opens the door only minutes later, mouth set firm in a frown.

“You’ve made Prince Sebastian quite displeased,” he informs Blaine as he sits down next to him on the bed.

“I don’t care what Sebastian thinks,” Blaine snarls. He’d thought that the anger had dissipated since Sebastian had left him, but now he finds hot tears seeping in his eyes.

“You’ve made your choice that quickly?” Kurt says, voice pinched for some reason. “You want Prince Adam to be your dominant?”

Blaine startles, tears spilling over. “What? No! I don’t want either of them to dom me, Kurt, I want you.” Kurt’s frown only deepens.

“Do you really?”

“Since when have you been doubting our relationship?” Blaine sputters, perplexed and upset. Tears are running freely down his face now. He’d expected soothing sympathy and gentle words from Kurt, not clipped questions and strange distance.

“Since you first collapsed at the stable!” Kurt snaps, wringing his hands. “Since when have you been so confident that you don’t want one of these princes to dominate you?”

Blaine’s eyes widen. He feels a tear splatter off his chin and onto his lap. “What do you mean, since I first collapsed at the stable? You had no problem dominating me then.”

Kurt shakes his head. “You needed someone, Blaine. Did you not see how distraught I was afterward?”

“Yes, but I thought that was because Cooper should’ve been my first! Not because you didn’t want me!”

“Blaine,” Kurt says, standing to face him and running a hand through his hair, “when have I ever not wanted you?”

“Right now!” Blaine shouts, standing as well, tightening his hands into fists. “Right now, when you ask which prince I’ve chosen and you should know very well I want no dom but you! When have I showed any excitement about having to choose a suitor? When have _I_ ever not wanted _you_?”

Kurt’s voice breaks, and it is with a start that Blaine realizes he’s crying, too. “You can’t know what you want, Blaine. You’re going to have a connection with the first person who dominated you whether you actually want them or not. And you’re still in your sickness. When you’re like this, didn’t Chandler tell you how vulnerable you are? How confused you’ll be about who you want, because the sickness wants you to submit to the nearest dom?” He looks as lost and sad as Blaine feels, which isn’t right, because Blaine’s job is to make his dom happy, his job is to make Kurt happy.

But right now he’s mad. “Then why have I not submitted to Sebastian, Kurt? He kissed me against that door when I told him that I wanted a moment by myself, and I turned from him and shut the door in his face! He’s been—” Blaine’s face twists in disgust—“touching me, all morning, and all I want is to escape it. The only time I want to submit is when I’m with you.”

Kurt’s mouth opens, then snaps shut with a clack. “He’s been touching you?”

Blaine relaxes with the familiar expression of possessiveness on Kurt’s face. “Not—not anywhere horrible. He’s, um, he’s been pinching my ass, and he kissed me, but that was all.”

“He kissed you,” Kurt says, something clicking into place in his mind. “He told Cooper that you were flirting with him all morning, and when you kissed him outside your room, you had a sudden fit and closed the door in his face.”

Blaine winces. “That’s what you heard?”

Kurt takes Blaine’s hands in his and pushes him back onto the bed, kissing him only when Blaine’s head hits the pillow. Blaine opens his mouth under Kurt’s, arches up when Kurt rolls his hips down and puts a hand on Blaine’s clothed chest.

“I’m sorry for doubting you,” he says when they pull apart to breathe, resting his forehead on Blaine’s. Kurt slides down his body easily, taking off Blaine’s breeches as he reaches Blaine’s waist. “I’m sorry.” He pulls Blaine’s cock from his undergarments and tucks the fabric under Blaine’s balls. Kurt takes Blaine’s cock into his mouth and grabs Blaine’s ass where it’s thickest, pulls Blaine’s undergarments all the way down and shoves them around his ankles. “I’m sorry.” Blaine’s eyes roll back when he draws a finger over his perineum. Kurt unhooks Blaine’s undergarments from his ankles and tosses them somewhere back on the bed, putting Blaine’s knees over his shoulders and spreading his cheeks.

“Gods—Kurt, please, stop apologizing, and—”

Kurt licks a broad, wet stripe over Blaine’s balls before he clamps his lips over Blaine’s clenching hole, licking as deep inside as he can go. Blaine moans, high-pitched and drawn out.

“You’ll have to be quiet,” Kurt warns, pulling back from Blaine’s ass slightly. “Do I need to put something in your mouth to keep you that way?” Blaine whimpers.

“Please, sir.”

Kurt finds where he’d thrown Blaine’s undergarments behind him and presses the fabric against Blaine’s mouth. Blaine trembles when he sees what it is.

“Open,” Kurt orders. He slides the ball of fabric into Blaine’s mouth easily. “Good boy.”

He returns his attention to Blaine’s ass, which is covered in fine dark hairs and growing red from where Kurt is squeezing it in his hands. Kurt sets his jaw and begins again in earnest, forcing his tongue as deep inside of Blaine as it can go, closing his lips repeatedly over Blaine’s spit-slicked rim and listening to Blaine’s little aborted grunts and moans coming through the fabric. He tastes sharp and bitter here, faintly of the soap Kurt had washed him with last night, but mostly of musk and boy. Kurt turns from Blaine’s red, worked-open hole, and licks softly over the thin skin of his inner thighs. There are purpling half-moon bruises here still, and Kurt sucks at each one, biting gently and then laving them with his tongue. He turns them from healing purple to fresh raw red within minutes, and he laughs when Blaine’s heels dig into his back, forcing their bodies closer still. Something like hope has bubbled in his chest, the feeling that maybe it’s not just the initial dominant and submissive connection that binds him and Blaine. If Blaine really was able to turn from Sebastian, another dominant, like that, then maybe it was a testament to something greater between the two of them, something Blaine and Sebastian would never have.

Kurt only has to take Blaine’s balls into his mouth before he’s shooting come all over his chest, and Kurt licks it from his belly and nipples, smiling when Blaine squirms against his teasing kisses and licks. He has half a mind to tell Blaine how irresistibly little his nipples are, nothing more than darker smudges of skin against his upper chest, but resists, drawing his thumb harsh over them instead and taking the fabric from Blaine’s mouth with his other hand.

“You haven’t,” Blaine says at once, grasping Kurt’s cock clumsily through his trousers, “you haven’t come. Can I—?”

Kurt straddles Blaine’s chest in response to the unasked question, tracing the shape of Blaine’s lips with the head of his cock. “Don’t try to take me in to the back of your throat right now, sweetheart. I need to teach you how to open properly for my cock before then, alright?” Blaine nods confirmation, then seals his lips around the head of Kurt’s cock, sucking him softly and jacking the rest of his cock in short pulls. It takes three of these and two bobs of Blaine’s head once he’s experimentally hollowed his cheeks around Kurt’s cock for him to come, Blaine swallowing obediently around him. Kurt climbs off Blaine, wraps his arms around him and kisses him, tasting his come on Blaine’s tongue.

“Are you okay with swallowing, baby?” he says, curious. Blaine shrugs.

“It’s an acquired taste, I guess. But it cleans up better, so I can do it.” Kurt smiles against his lips, tilts his head up to kiss Blaine’s nose.

“Beautiful boy.”

Blaine’s embarrassed frown speaks for itself.

“Mm, no. You are beautiful. I’ll do everything I can to show you just how much,” Kurt says, brushing kisses slow over Blaine’s cheekbones. One of his hands comes up to brush sweaty curls back from Blaine’s blushing face.

“Maybe if you finally took me—”

Kurt shakes his head. “I’m waiting for you to figure out what to do with these two suitors and the throne, then you’ll have your reward.”

Blaine reddens darker. “It’s a reward, then?”

“Mm.” Kurt’s other hand runs along Blaine’s still damp crack, feeling the warm skin clench under the press of his fingers. “That’s how I’d like to see it, yes.”

“And what do you mean—” Blaine’s breath hitches when one of Kurt’s finger’s slides between his cheeks—“what do you mean, figure out what to do with the throne?”  
Kurt rubs gently against Blaine’s hole with a knuckle, takes the time to construct his response.

“Have you thought yet about why your father was so adamant of you not running the kingdom?”

“It was his dying wish,” Blaine says in a manner that suggests he’d rather not think of his father with one of Kurt’s hands teasing slowly over his rim. “But I don’t know what you mean—”

“Did you ever see how he treated your mother?”

Blaine bites his lips and squirms his ass further onto Kurt’s hand. “Um, not really. She died when I was ten. I don’t have many memories of her, and the ones I do have are not with my father.”

“Blaine,” says Kurt, speaking slowly, trying to think of a good way to phrase his sentence, “were you ever made aware why your father favored Cooper over you?”

Blaine draws away from Kurt slightly; Kurt can see he’s hit a nerve. “N-no, just that—that Cooper was so much, well, he was just better, in his studies, in his ambitions—I was too, uh, soft, I liked animals and the stable and music class, he liked fencing and chasing girls. I always figured it was, well, because I preferred men.”

The hand between Blaine’s cheeks drags itself out and settles above Blaine’s ass, Kurt’s knuckles rubbing into the small of Blaine’s back.

“Your father did not have a problem with homosexuality, Blaine.” The hand that Kurt had been resting on Blaine’s face grasps the nape of his neck, sudden and firm. “Your father had a problem with submissives.”

Blaine’s face contorts briefly before he’s responding, “But—that—that wouldn’t have anything to do with him giving Cooper the throne, would it? Cooper’s older, I mean. It’s natural that he’d inherit it.” Kurt drops a kiss to the corner of Blaine’s mouth.

“Right. But Prince Adam is the middle of five children. He has two older brothers, yet his parents have already made clear that he will inherit the throne. Your father didn’t say that he wanted Cooper in charge of the kingdom. He said he wanted you not in charge of the kingdom.”

Something shifts and dawns in Blaine’s face. “Because I’m submissive?”

Kurt nods mutely, presses Blaine’s body close to his own as Blaine ducks his head to Kurt’s chest. By now he recognizes this as a gesture saying that Blaine is upset and needs Kurt’s comfort, and this is confirmed by the wetness seeping into Kurt’s shirt: tears.

Blaine shakes in his arms, pulls his knees to his chest and makes his small frame absolutely tiny against Kurt, who tightens his arms around the boy in response.

When he speaks again, it’s low against Kurt’s ribcage, slightly muffled by the fabric of Kurt’s shirt. “So all this time when I thought he hated me because I was homosexual, he hated me because I was a sub?” Kurt hooks a finger under Blaine’s chin, tilts his head up to look Kurt in the eye.

“He’s not here anymore, Blaine. The only people that know his dying wish are you, Cooper, and the slaves in the palace. Cooper doesn’t want the throne, and the slaves don’t particularly want his absentminded self ruling the kingdom either.” Kurt smiles at the understanding clear in Blaine’s gold eyes. “You realize this now?”

Blaine trembles, uncurls his body to lay against Kurt’s own. Their legs tangle unconsciously. He bites at the plumpness of his lower lip. “If Cooper lets me have the throne, I can make submissives throughout the whole kingdom become people again.”

Pride unfurls in Kurt’s chest, a blossom underneath his thrumming heart. “Yes, sweetheart. Yes.”

“I can make them respected again,” Blaine says, inhales, exhales. “I can let them be in the militia, I can let them take higher jobs in the workplace. I can make them people, Kurt.” Kurt brings both hands to cup Blaine’s face again, rubs their noses together gently. The wonder in Blaine’s eyes is exhilarating to watch. “And—” Blaine’s voice breaks subtly, but he continues, “and I can let you be my dominant. I don’t have to choose between Adam and Sebastian. I can choose you, Kurt—if you’ll have me.”

Kurt exhales and presses their lips together in a soft, chaste kiss. “Of course I’ll have you, Blaine. Of course.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i'm thinking of changing the title of this story, mainly because it doesn't really fit in with anything else. so be forewarned, if that's how you're tracking this fic--you might want to bookmark it or something because you won't be able to search it up once i've changed the name. that being said, suggestions of new names for this thing are very welcome! i'm torn between a bunch of fun. lyrics right now, so feel free to throw titles at me in the comments. thank you guys so much for reading (and kudos to you if you recognized the princess bride reference)!


	6. chapter five

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> things happen. d/s things happen. no klaine sex here, and i do apologize for that. but there is an awful lot of talking and plot. so enjoy.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> early update because this weekend will be hell for me, ugh. all my love to my beta, nora, for her help and support throughout this story.

Blaine leaves his room five minutes after Kurt closed the door behind him. He intends to find Cooper, but who he finds is Sebastian, kneeling on the floor of the North Wing’s hallway. Chandler and Kurt are standing over him. Chandler looks sad, but Kurt looks livid.

As he draws closer, he can make out the words falling desperate from Sebastian’s mouth and sees more clearly the shape of his erection tenting his breeches.

“Please, please, please—”

“Kurt,” Chandler says, eyes shifting between the man next to him and the boy on the ground, “you need to dominate him.”

“Absolutely not.” Kurt is shaking with untapped rage. Blaine wants to kneel just seeing him that powerful, then the full force of what Chandler had said shocks into him. _Sebastian_ needs to be _dominated_?

“It’s only his first bout, Kurt, please,” Chandler says, grinding his palm against his forehead.

“Don’t you start begging too.” Kurt glares down at Sebastian’s kneeling form.

“Kurt,” Blaine says, and when Kurt’s eyes find him, he stops, forgetting what he was going to say. Words come anyway, stumbling thick over his tongue. “You can dominate him. It won’t—I won’t—it’s okay. He needs it.”

“I will not give him anything,” Kurt says, stubborn as a mule from his stable. “I don’t care what he needs. He tried to dominate you, Blaine, tried to come here and trick you into submitting to him—I absolutely _refuse_.”

Adam’s lilting, accented voice cuts through the tension in the air. “What’s going on, gentlemen?” He pauses in the doorway from the kitchen. “Oh, gods.”

“I won’t dominate him,” Kurt says again as if Adam hadn’t spoken. “I can’t believe that he would try to manipulate Blaine like this, how _dare_ —”

“I’ll do it, then,” Adam says decisively, then turns to Blaine apologetically. “If you’ll let me, of course. It would be rude if I didn’t ask—”

“No, no,” Blaine says, shaking his head perhaps more violently than he should. “You—you can take him to your quarters, take care of him there.” Sebastian emits a particularly loud whine. Adam looks concerned, Chandler winces, and Kurt stares at the wall like he can burn a hole through it if he tries hard enough.

“With your permission granted,” Adam says, eyebrows raising, “I will gladly take him to my room and take care of him.” Chandler walks to Blaine, takes his wrist, and leads him away—it takes Kurt a moment to follow, but he finally drags his glare from the wall to Chandler, who drops Blaine’s wrist instantly.

When there’s no one left in the hall but Sebastian and Adam, the dominant prince kneels in front of Sebastian and speaks quietly to him.

“Shh, it’s alright, I’m here, I’m going to take care of you.” He takes Sebastian’s shaking hands from where they had dug into the carpet beside him and looks at him softly. “Have you ever been kissed, darling?” Sebastian shakes his head. Humiliated tears are starting to streak from his eyes, but Adam ignores them. “Head up,” he orders, and Sebastian’s head jerks on level with Adam’s. “There you go. How long have you been ignoring your submissive desires?”

Sebastian sobs suddenly, just once, letting it rack through his body. “A month, sir.”

Adam considers this and nods. “That’s very dangerous, honey. So you’ve had your mark for a month? You should’ve gotten your first bout of sickness three weeks ago. You don’t have anyone at your palace to placate you?”

Sebastian shakes his head again. “If my p-parents—if they knew, they’d disown me. My—my mother had two miscarriages and one d-daughter, before me. My dad wanted her—my s-sister—killed, but she was s-showing signs of possible dominance, and he w-wouldn’t kill another dom, s-so he left her i-in the forest.” Adam takes this in slowly.

“So you have to be dominant, then?”

“If—if I want my mother to live. Yes. She—she filled in my open circle, w-when I got it, with ink. Said it was th-the only way both of us wouldn’t be k-killed.”

“I see,” Adam says softly. He puts his hand over Sebastian’s clothed cock and feels it pulse. “You may come now.” Sebastian shivers. His cock throbs once, twice, and then soaks the front of his trousers with semen as Adam strokes him over his clothes. “We’ll go back to my room to get cleaned up, alright, darling?” Sebastian nods. Adam leans in and kisses him once, chaste and gentle. When he pulls back, Sebastian is surprised to see the starts of a smile pulling around his eyes.

“That was my first kiss, too,” Adam says, and helps Sebastian to his feet, not letting go of his wrists. “Let’s go to my room. We can talk more there.”

-

As soon as they round the corner, Kurt dismisses Chandler with a flick of his hand. He knows Mercedes’ room is bound to be empty, at this time of day she’s in the kitchen helping to make lunch, so that’s where he leads Blaine. It’s only when the door closes behind him that he realizes how much Blaine is shaking. He opens his mouth to say something but Blaine drops to his knees faster than imagining. He wraps his arms around Kurt’s calves and cries himself raw. Then he pulls himself up and sinks into Mercedes’ big armchair, pulling his knees to his chest and looking for all the world like a ten-year-old.

“I’m sorry,” Kurt says for at least the fourth time today.

“No,” Blaine says, still trembling, “no, no, thank you, thank you for not dominating him, thank you for not doing that to me—just, just, do you see what it _does_ to people?”

Kurt isn’t sure what he means. He squeezes into the armchair beside Blaine and puts a hand on his knee.

“Being submissive, I mean,” Blaine says, voice small and sad. “I—I never knew, just how much people didn’t want to—to be like this.” His throat seizes up in a silent cry, and when it releases tears are streaming again from his big wet eyes. “Because we’re—we’re so weak.” Kurt tucks his legs underneath him and sits up straight, looking down at Blaine’s crumpled face.

“Do you know what I think?” he says after a loaded pause. Blaine hiccups, brings his knees away from his chest, and Kurt kisses him because he doesn’t know what else to do, can’t think of another chastely physical way to calm him. “I think you’re so brave, Blaine. I think submissives are strong. Because you need to come to terms with the fact that everyone thinks you’re lesser, just for being a sub, and you need to come to terms with what your body needs—that it’s in your blood that you need to be broken down so that you can build yourself back up and be stronger and more powerful than before. Submissives are not weak, Blaine. The world is terrible for them, and that’s why they don’t want to be submissive, but you’re going to change that. Your kingdom is going to be the first with a submissive king. You’re going to change the way people think. You’re going to push off everyone who’s ever doubted you and you’re going to _fly_.”

Blaine takes in a shaky breath and looks at Kurt, really looks at him. He sees the earnestness of his blue-gray-green eyes and he sees the fierce determination shining in them, the determination to get Blaine to see in himself what Kurt had seen all along. He blinks, and remembers something. “Do—do you think that I’m going to doubt us again?”

Kurt’s confusion is written across his brow. “Because Sebastian is submissive,” Blaine clarifies. “And I had no problem turning down his—offers, to me, and that proved to you that I wouldn’t just jump at any dom because I’m in my sickness. But he’s not a dominant. Do you think that I’m not going to want you anymore?”

Kurt looks at his lap. “Blaine.” He stops, and clears his throat, and starts again. “Blaine, I’ve said a lot of things to you, and not all of them were right.” He blinks slowly, considering his next words. “Honestly, I don’t know if you’re going to want me after your sickness or not. But that’s not what’s important.” Blaine starts to cut him off, and Kurt puts a finger to his lips. “Hear me out. A dom and sub’s relationship is about the dominant and submissive’s wants and needs, yes. But it’s not just a relationship between a dom and a sub. It’s a relationship between two people. Relationships are full of taking risks, taking chances. This—this is a risk I’m willing to take, with your sickness not being over yet. I don’t want you to try to prove yourself to me or anything, because that’s not what this is about. I’m going to the country for five days. I leave tomorrow. And I want you to write me everything that happens between you, Adam, and Sebastian and send me a letter. I’ll be waiting for it. And by the time I get back, you should be in the third bout of your sickness, and I’ll dominate you, and then we’ll see where we are. This isn’t about dominants and submissives, Blaine. This—this relationship? It’s about us.”

Blaine stares at Kurt with an unreadable expression, and Kurt feels himself a little uncomfortable as its subject. But then Blaine kisses him, and Kurt threads his fingers through Blaine’s curls and kisses back, and when Mercedes opens the door to her room that’s how she finds them, lips pressed together, bodies curled up in her armchair. They don’t notice her presence, and she closes the door softly behind

Clearly something’s gone right.

-

_Dearest Kurt—_

_Adam and Sebastian appear to be quite besotted with each other, if the way they stick their tongues down each others’ throats every two seconds is any indication. Please don’t think me bitter—I’m just a bit put out that you’re not here so I can have someone to satisfy my own needs. Sebastian and I have been talking quite a bit. I can’t send him back to his kingdom—it’s clear that if he comes back without me as his submissive his father will quite literally kill him and his mother—and honestly, I’m wondering what to do. Adam’s parents have been informed of the situation. His mother and two older brothers, Arnold and Andrew, are coming to the kingdom in a few days, around the time you’ll be getting back. They’re unsure what to do as well, but perhaps mutual confusion will produce more benefits than me just sitting at my desk and scratching my head._

_We haven’t had this many visitors since my father passed—it’s a little overwhelming, but Chandler is very helpful in organizing everything. He’s also in love with you. He says he doesn’t care whether you know or not anymore, because he’s been trying to tell you during the past few months but things haven’t exactly worked out in his favor. I do feel bad for him, but I suppose you could be with him if I end up unwilling to be with you after this whole sickness is over._

_I’ve been researching in the palace library and found some books on relationships between dominants and submissives. (I wonder if my blush is so apparent you can read it in my handwriting.) There’s a lot of interesting things in them that we’ll have to look at together. There’s sexual advice, of course, which I’d not be opposed to you experimenting with on me, but just general information as to how these sorts of relationships typically work. I also read about why you didn’t want to touch my mark until you were absolutely certain I wanted to be with you. That’s understandable. If you do ever touch my mark, I’d like also to touch yours. I haven’t seen it on your back in a place similar to mine, so I’m guessing it must be elsewhere. I’m trying to not guess too much where else it might be, as that’s proving very distracting to my studies._

_Well, speaking of my studies, Elliott and Mike are wanting me for my fencing lesson. Mercedes and Sam send their love to you, by the way. Actually Mercedes sends her love, but she said by extension that means Sam sends his love too, so there you have it. Elliott is threatening to sing something lewd under my window if I don’t get myself to the courtyard in five minutes, so I guess I’d better go get ready._

_Yours,_

_Blaine_

_-_

_Dear Blaine,_

_Thank you, firstly, for writing to me. I hope your third bout arrives on time, as I don’t want anyone to take care of you like that but myself. I think I’ve thought of a solution to Sebastian’s problem, but I don’t trust the messenger Kitty said would deliver this to you (someone called Jacob Ben Israel), so I’ll refrain from stating it here. I will, however, tell you the outcome of Kitty’s own predicament. As I told Mercedes to tell you, there was a falling out between her and her submissive, Marley. Marley was found in a neighboring farm (though if you’d ever been to the countryside, you’d know that the farms are miles from each other), and she explained to Kitty that she understood why Kitty’s hurtful comments had been made, and that she wasn’t quite ready to forgive her. However, she has agreed to move back to my childhood house with Kitty, which is good, as Kitty goes somewhat more insane than usual without her submissive around. Kitty and Marley are good for each other, and I do hope that they will stay with each other in the long run of things._

_I was informed by a letter from Chandler about the more complex matters of Sebastian’s submissiveness that I’m sure you yourself were just told of after I departed the palace. I’d like to remind you of Sebastian’s mother’s two previous miscarriages before she had Sebastian, and also of Sebastian’s older sister, who was a dominant abandoned by Sebastian’s father in the forest. Upon some closer research, it appears that Sebastian’s older sister was not only a few years older than he, she was also left in a plot of the wood on the boundary of the Smythe kingdom territory and the Anderson kingdom territory. I spoke to Kitty about my theory, and she quite agrees with me._

_Ah, speaking of Chandler—I was aware that he might still have harbored a crush or some minor feelings for me after I dominated him and then decided we were better friends, but I’m afraid I wasn’t aware of the whole ‘love’ thing that he apparently has for me. Unfortunately there is nothing to be done for that._

_Kitty informs me that if I don’t finish writing this letter soon, it will get to the palace after I do in two days._

_You are indeed mine,_

_Kurt_


	7. chapter six

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> so, sex. that's a thing.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> firstly, please note that this fic will be changing titles as of its next update. this is your last chance to track/bookmark/subscribe/whatever you need to do to make sure you can find it next under its new name. secondly, this chapter is............ let's be honest........... mostly porn. warnings for blowjobs, punishment, facefucking/throatfucking, choking, implied breathplay, marking, allusions to weight... stuff, and implied crossdressing/genderplay. cool.

A few days without Kurt and Blaine almost can’t stand it. Sam and Mercedes help him to not be lonely, as Cooper is still up to his elbows in legality papers over the horrible economic state of the kingdom. However, they cannot satisfy him in others way as only Kurt can do, and Blaine has awoken with a hard cock and aching hole on—well, if he’s being honest, it’s happened every morning since Kurt left. Chandler had previously told him that the wet dreams would become more persistent as the third and final bout of sub sickness loomed closer. He’d also told Blaine that during the third bout, his submissive hormones would be at their peak and releasing even more frenetic energy than the first two bouts had. He would be transformed into a mass of raw, sobbing need—as much as it scared Blaine, it did not frighten him nearly as much as the slight possibility that Kurt might not get back to the palace in time for his third bout to occur. Kurt had assured him that he’d time it as perfectly as he could, but Blaine still awakens in the morning, hole throbbing and empty and cock thrashing against his abdomen as he teases over his nipples. Kurt hasn’t told him to, but Blaine has resolved to not touch anywhere below his cock and to not give himself release until his dominant returned from the countryside. This had proved to be a torturous effort, as Blaine’s sore hole is constantly reminding him.  
  
He forbids himself from touching lower than his cock, which means that he can’t even press his thumbs into the bruises in his thighs and let himself cry out at the sparks of pleasure-pain it would bring. The marks on his collarbones have faded enough that he no longer has to wear his high-collared tunics, but they offer little release into ecstasy as touching the ones in his thighs would. It’s the day of Kurt’s promised return, however, when he awakes in a whining sweat and ruts down on the too-soft mattress of his bed. It can’t give nearly enough friction for the release that he has so sweetly denied himself for five days now. Blaine wraps a hand around his cock and gives it a hard stroke, but it only makes him hurt more with the knowledge that as much as he wants to come, he knows Kurt will be much more pleased if he has managed to deny himself these days while he was gone.  
  
He forces himself to breathe normally and slow his heartbeat until his cock is no longer jerking into the air and he can pull on a pair of light blue breeches without it being uncomfortable. He laces them up the sides tighter than he should, then buttons up a tight, brightly colored tunic that he knows will show the muscles in his back when he’s turned around. Blaine hesitates before he slides a faintly patterned vest from his chest of drawers and cinches it tight over his chest and lower back, remembering Kurt’s comments about how it would make his waist tiny. It hugs him high in the front and low on the back, still big on him despite the fact that he’s laced it as tight as it will go, and if it didn’t hook over his shoulders to tie in the back Blaine imagines it would be more corset than vest. He selects his black knee-high boots and examines himself in the mirror. With his curls spilling looser over his neck and how his eyelashes are dark and curled of their own accord, Blaine finds himself looking almost effeminate. He squirms in his breeches as he remembers another comment Kurt had made under his breath when drying him off from their bath together, a comment Blaine is almost certain Kurt didn’t mean for him to hear, a comment Blaine is sure Kurt doesn’t know Blaine know that he said. Taking measured breaths again to will his erection down, he straightens his vest one last time and descends the stairs, still a little uncertain whether he will get the desired reaction from Kurt with his outfit.  
  
He turns down a hallway to greet Adam and finds that the blond prince has Sebastian pinned against a door, sucking dark bruises into his neck and pressing the heel of his palm to where Sebastian is hard in his trousers. Blaine clears his throat, and Adam’s hand drifts up to Sebastian’s abdomen as he turns to greet him.  
  
“Glad to see you’re both doing well,” Blaine says with a smirk, and Adam laughs loudly, pressing a kiss to Sebastian’s cheek. Sebastian still is a bit uncomfortable about Blaine seeing him in such submissive positions after his aborted attempt to ‘dominate’ him (as is evidenced by the flush crawling down his neck), but Blaine has made it very clear to him that all is forgiven and hopefully that will resonate more soundly in him soon.  
  
“Good morning,” Adam says, and Blaine tries to not stare where his hand is creeping lower on Sebastian’s body, and to not notice how Sebastian arches slightly into his touch. “Mm, it is a good morning, right, darling?” Sebastian averts his eyes from Blaine to nod, but Blaine sees the shadow of a shy smile on his lips and addresses him directly.  
  
“I’m happy to see you with him,” he says, and Sebastian meets his eyes finally. “Kurt wrote me that he has a solution to your problem—with your father, I mean. He didn’t want to disclose the details in epistolary, but he did say that once he got back he would make an effort to explain it to you.”  
  
Adam smiles genially. “I’m sure that he’ll first want to greet you properly, but afterwards I know Seb will be happy to hear whatever he proposes.” Blaine blushes.  
  
“I can’t blame him,” Sebastian pipes up. “If I was your dominant, I wouldn’t keep my hands off you for a second.” It’s a teasing remark, Blaine is sure—this doesn’t mean he can’t see the way Adam’s eyes flicker dark and he says something low to Sebastian that sounds like “But you’re my submissive, and that sort of talk will get you a spanking.” Sebastian shifts Adam’s hand from his crotch to his ass, and Blaine feels his eyebrows raise of their own accord.  
  
“Well, I should be getting to breakfast,” he says, hurrying down to the main dining room before he can see anything more. The way Adam is treating Sebastian is making his submissive hormones buzz like mad, and he feels too persistently alive with the want, the desire, the need—  
  
“Blaine!”  
  
Blaine spins around, sees him standing at the end of the room, and before he can think of doing anything else he’s literally running into Kurt’s open arms. Their mouths meet with a clack of teeth and the wet slide of tongue, and then Kurt pulls away—Blaine can’t help chasing his mouth a little—to hold him at arms’ length.  
  
“Look at you, beautiful. You look so _pretty_.” Blaine feels himself preen under the praise.  
  
“You’ve only been gone five days,” he says, but gives himself to the embrace when Kurt’s hands find his waist, squeezing gently. Blaine can feel his stomach hanging out from the space between where the vest constricts his lower ribs and his breeches hug his upper pelvis, and he flushes bright red when Kurt’s hands wander under his shirt to stroke over the soft roundness of his belly.  
  
“You’ve kept your appetite up,” Kurt murmurs approvingly. “That means you’ll have plenty of food to work off when we fuck on every surface in your room.” Blaine shivers.  
“I haven’t eaten breakfast, though.”  
  
“Well, whatever Mercedes and the others cooked smells amazing,” Kurt says. Neither of them makes a move toward the table. Blaine feels strands of arousal beginning to draw themselves in his groin and he shifts against Kurt to find his cock already hardening on his thigh.  
  
“You’ve got a choice, baby,” Kurt tells him, the pet name falling from his lips like a hand stroking Blaine’s spine. “Do you want to eat, or do you want to fuck?”  
  
Blaine draws in a deep breath. “In the five days you’ve been gone, I’ve forbid myself from touching anywhere below my cock and from letting myself come. I think I’d rather you fuck me first.”  
  
-  
  
Kurt’s hands don’t leave his body once during the clumsy trip back to Blaine’s bedroom, during which Kurt loses his shoes somewhere in the hallway and they can’t help but stop every ten seconds for kissing, or Kurt’s mouth freshening the almost-gone marks on Blaine’s collarbones, or Blaine biting as hard as he dares at Kurt’s neck, or Kurt’s hands squeezing at Blaine’s ass, pulling his cheeks as far apart as they’ll go under his breeches and hissing, “Did you dress with the intent to torture me this morning?”  
  
Blaine feels the old familiar stirrings of sickness dizzying his head and stiffening his erection as Kurt locks the door behind them and orders, “On the bed. Hands and knees, now.”  
  
Blaine scrambles to comply, then turns his head back to look at Kurt. “Sir—sir—don’t you want my clothes off?”  
  
Kurt smiles the torturous smile that means he knows exactly what Blaine wants and will deny that from him as long as he possibly can. “Seeing as you chose your outfit so carefully for me today, baby, I think I deserve to undress you just as carefully.” Blaine’s breath stutters out of him when Kurt climbs onto the bed behind him and slides a finger to the divide of his asscheeks, not pressing hard enough that the fabric will catch Blaine where he wants, but not pressing so gently that Blaine doesn’t know exactly what he’s doing.  
  
“Evil,” he chokes out, and Kurt laughs.  
  
“Head down. You may make noise—I love what dirty things come from such a pretty little mouth—but no words, understand?”  
  
“Yes, sir,” Blaine says. Every hormone that’s been on end since this morning is tingling, making him shake imperceptibly as he holds the position Kurt had requested of him. At the distinct, recognizable command, they settle somewhat, but Blaine’s hands are still twisting the sheets beneath him. He waits, knowing that Kurt has yet to decide what to do with him, and the delicious anticipation makes him strain so hard against his tight breeches it physically pains him.  
  
Finally, he feels Kurt’s hands slide off his boots, steady themselves on his calves, and then—then what is undoing the laces up the sides of his breeches? He whines when he feels the hot wetness of Kurt’s tongue on his upper thigh and realizes that Kurt is undoing the knots with his mouth. Thinking about it doesn’t surprise him—he’s had Kurt’s tongue as far as it could go up his ass, he is perfectly aware of how talented it is—but when the breeches fall from his legs he gasps at the cool air on his exposed cock and balls. Kurt’s thumbs are spreading him gently as he says, “Turn over and sit with the backs of your knees on the edge of the bed. I’m going to go down on you.”  
  
Blaine shakes as he turns himself and sits upright. The jolt of Kurt being physically beneath him, kneeling as he rubs circles into Blaine’s hips, makes his submissive hormones twitch and say _no, wrong, Dom goes over sub, above sub, presses into sub_ —when suddenly another side of him leaps up to say, _Dom does to sub what Dom wants to do to sub. Kurt will do as he pleases to me and sub will accept, take, receive whatever he gives me._ Blaine grips the edge of his bed so hard his knuckles turn white, then shouts when Kurt sinks his mouth over him.  
  
“You may move as much as you want,” Kurt says around his mouthful of Blaine’s cock, and then he’s licking up down Blaine’s length, taking Blaine’s long-neglected balls and rolling them in their sac, making Blaine’s eyes go back in his head.  
  
“Ohhhh,” he sighs, and then yells when Kurt hollows his cheeks and takes him down till Blaine can feel the head of his cock at the back of Kurt’s throat, Kurt’s nose is buried in his pubic hair and he’s sucking Blaine down enthusiastically.  
  
Kurt pulls off and says, “Good boy,” before lifting Blaine’s balls out of the way and bruising his mouth into the softness of the skin behind them, making Blaine thrash and sob out, and then his tongue is barely pointing at the wrinkled rim of Blaine’s hole before Blaine is crying,  
  
“Please, please, please—” and Kurt pulls away completely, no longer touching Blaine’s body at all. Blaine makes a strangled noise when he realizes that the only rule Kurt had instated was that he couldn’t say actual words, and he bites down the urge to apologize, knowing that will only make it worse.  
  
“What did I say, sweetheart?” Kurt is standing, hands made to fists at his sides. Blaine shakes his head and whimpers. “Answer me with real words, baby. What did I say you couldn’t do?”  
  
“Say full words, sir,” Blaine says, feeling his Adam’s apple work out the words because Kurt’s hand is suddenly almost all the way around his throat and it’s tight and uncomfortable and hard to breathe and so, so _good ___.  
  
“That’s right,” Kurt croons. He clenches his grip closer around Blaine’s throat, watching the way his Adam’s apple bobs and bobs, trying to swallow. “And what do I do when you don’t follow my orders?”  
  
“P-punish me, sir.” Kurt slightly releases his hold when he speaks, not wanting to literally choke Blaine, but instantly grips hard again when Blaine’s mouth shuts and he’s gulped down some air.  
  
“Very good.” He sees tears starting to prickle in Blaine’s eyes; he knows the grip is hurting but he also knows that Blaine’s erection is still dribbling all over his delicately patterned vest. “I’m not going to spank you, beautiful.” Kurt grins when he sees Blaine’s face, full of anticipation, almost fall at that. “No, I think you on your back, hands underneath you and throat working to take all of my cock, that will do. How do you feel about me fucking your face, baby?”  
  
Blaine’s tears are streaming steadily down his face now. Snot is bubbling from his nose and he can’t sniffle it back without choking himself inadvertently. His cheeks are high apples of red and his throat is corded up and prominently veined under Kurt’s fingers. He has, in Kurt’s opinion, never looked more beautiful. He nods, at this rate, it must hurt too much to speak. Kurt releases his throat slowly, he knows that if he does it too fast Blaine may actually choke on the air he’s been denied. He smears Blaine’s tears around his eyelashes with his now free hand and finds Blaine’s ass with the other, gives it a hard squeeze.  
  
“On your back, or do I have to ask you again?” Blaine quickly pulls up his legs and lays his head back on the pillow. His entire body is shaking, and Kurt watches it with a pleased little smile. This is what he had been talking about when he was telling Blaine how strong submissives were: he’d put Blaine through an almost-chokehold and denied him the spanking he thought he was going to get for speaking out, and now he was going to fuck that same exhausted throat and take Blaine apart, thrust by thrust—this kind of breaking down in order to build up, the way one’s muscles need to burn and tear during effective exercise so that they can grow over, better, stronger—Kurt could never imagine someone braver than Blaine, putting his trust so wholly in his dominant and accepting whatever Kurt decided was best for him.  
  
He straddles Blaine’s chest easily, undoing the buttons of his trousers and taking out his cock, watching Blaine’s mouth open without prompting. “Five thrusts,” Kurt says, tucking Blaine’s hands neatly behind his back, “five thrusts of taking my cock all the way to the back of your throat and that’s your punishment, that’s the end of it. If you need out—not if you want out, because you will _want_ out, your throat will be burning and choking and you won’t be able to breathe properly—but if you absolutely _need_ out, all you need to say is stop. Just that one word—nothing else counts, okay?” Blaine nods and gapes his mouth further.  
  
Without warning, Kurt shoves his cock as far as it will go into Blaine’s mouth, pushing through the resistance of Blaine’s esophagus and fucking as far back into his throat as he can go. Blaine chokes and stutters, eyelids fluttering wildly as he takes as best he can—Kurt pulls out halfway, watching the struggle on his sub’s face as he tries to obey Kurt and take his cock down. He gives Blaine two seconds to breathe before he’s fucking back into his mouth, feeling the slide of Blaine’s throat working, trying to give and open further for his dom, and then pulls out only slightly before he slams in for the third time, not even allowing Blaine time to breathe before he’s forcing himself down the wet flutter of Blaine’s throat again. He feels the resistance and shifts positions, pushing incessantly at the back of Blaine’s throat before he feels it give and Blaine’s nose is in the pubic hair at the base of his cock, Blaine choking as he tries to breathe around Kurt in his mouth. Kurt pulls out again, this time all the way, tracing the spit-smeared bright red of Blaine’s lips with the head of his cock. He can feel Blaine’s heart pounding beneath him as he regains his breath, sobbing and hiccupping. Kurt resists the urge to put a hand round his neck again, as lovely the image it would make, it’s not worth actually hurting Blaine when he’s been taking his punishment so well.  
  
“Two left, gorgeous,” Kurt says, settling for tracing the plump line of Blaine’s lower lip with his thumb instead, rubbing it gently. “You’re doing so well, baby, I’m so proud of you. Just two more and then I’ll let you come.” At the mention of finally reaching orgasm, Blaine whines and stretches his mouth as wide as it will go. Kurt laughs. “You’re so desperate for that release, aren’t you, sweetheart? I’ll even let you choose how I make you come. See if you think you can hold out long enough for me to tease your balls and ass with my fingers and make those bruises on your pretty little thighs all over again, hmm?” Blaine’s response is to open his mouth further still, eyes wet and pleading, and Kurt smiles before he forces his cock all the way into the back of Blaine’s throat in one go, fucking himself down into the tight heat. Blaine makes a choked off sound, and Kurt only pulls out half an inch at most before he snaps his hips forward and hits the back of Blaine’s throat for the final time. Blaine is making wet, sputtering noises as Kurt eases himself out and shudders with how close he is.  
  
“Gonna come on your face,” he warns, and Blaine’s mouth tries to open yet again. “Oh, you want it in your mouth? Come here, just the tip now, that’s right.” Blaine’s head comes off the pillow as he takes the head of Kurt’s cock in his mouth and sucks greedily. Kurt cries out as Blaine flicks his slit with his tongue and comes, keeps coming but watches as Blaine swallows it down his abused throat, then moans and pulls away when Blaine tries to keep sucking him even after he’s released everything he has.  
  
“Oh gods, come here,” Kurt breathes, sliding down and taking Blaine in his arms. “You did so well, baby, gods.” He laughs when Blaine purses his lips and makes his eyes go wide. “Yes, I’ll kiss you. That was amazing.” Kurt presses his mouth to his beautiful boy’s, tasting himself on Blaine’s lips. “Mmm, you’re so good for me. Was that what you needed?” Blaine, for once, breaks the kiss to respond, voice pitched high in desperation.  
  
“Sir, what I need right now is for you to touch me so I can come.”  
  
“Do you want my hands or my mouth?”  
  
“Hands, gods—I want your fingers on my cock, sir, please—”  
  
Kurt wraps a hand around Blaine’s length and jerks him fast, unsurprised to find him still mostly hard even after his punishment. Blaine’s mouth makes a little o as he comes, eyes closed and face scrunching up adorably.  
  
“You’re so _good_ ,” Kurt says, disbelieving. “I can’t believe how I ever got so lucky.”  
  
Blaine blushes, shy even now, and averts his eyes. “You know I’d do anything for you, sir. Any good sub would.”  
  
Kurt’s fingers prod Blaine’s red-streaked throat gently, his eyes filling more blue with concern. “You’re sure I didn’t push you too far, though? I wasn’t sure about the choking—is that okay for you?”  
  
Blaine shivers. “That—choking, you controlling my every breath—that was so hot, oh gods. You can do that any time you please, sir.”  
  
Kurt still wanders over Blaine’s Adam’s apple with his fingers, pressing lightly and watching to see if Blaine flinches. “I wasn’t too harsh? I didn’t do it so it would bruise, I do love seeing your gorgeous skin—”  
  
“Kurt,” Blaine interrupts, his hand coming up to still Kurt’s fingers. “I would’ve told you to stop, or I’d be mad with pain with your fingers on my neck now—believe me when I say I am fine.” Kurt sighs and grasps Blaine’s hand back.  
  
“I’m sorry. I just get worried. I care for you much too much to actually put you in so much pain.” Blaine shrugs.  
  
“It’s all right. But I’m tired and hungry, so I’m demanding cuddles and then once I feel like moving I want breakfast,” he says into Kurt’s neck, wriggling them both under a blanket and kissing Kurt’s jaw absently.  
  
“Bossy,” Kurt teases, and Blaine raises his eyebrows.  
  
“Hey, if you get to order me around while we’re intimate, I see no reason I can’t while we’re not.” Kurt tilts his head in acknowledgement.  
  
“Alright, but I’m staying on top of you while you sleep.” He smiles when Blaine blushes down to his collarbone. “Yes?”  
  
“I like having you on top of me,” he says quietly, snuggling further into Kurt’s chest. “’S comforting. And warm.”  
  
Kurt wraps his arms around Blaine and pulls their bodies flush together. Blaine’s eyes are sliding shut with slumber, so he doesn’t see any harm in whispering, “Sleep well” and tucking his chin over Blaine’s head.  
  
What he’s not expecting is Blaine murmuring “I love you” in response before he goes slack as dead weight in Kurt’s arms, completely asleep.


	8. chapter seven

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> warning for (minor) character death. like, you haven't even met the dead guy so don't worry 'bout it. it's sort of a short chapter for such a long wait, but another one will be up this coming weekend. alas, a sexless chapter, but lots of dialogue and plot abounds. if anything is confusing (because there are some MAJOR plot twists), feel free to ask for clarification in the comments.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> GUYS. first of all i'm so sorry for keeping you waiting for this but shit got real crazy around the holidays and i totally forgot to post. also i've been writing more chapters instead of actually posting them. whoops. comments/kudos/anything really is much appreciated!

Blaine awakens to a warm bed but with a cold body. He shivers, and two glances left and right tell him that Kurt is no longer here, explaining why he is not warm and wrapped up in his dom’s embrace. A breeze curls softly from his half-open window and flutters a piece of paper not previously on his side desk. Blaine grabs it and recognizes Kurt’s handwriting as he eagerly reads it.  
  
 _By the time you read this, it will be lunch—if the way you passed out in my arms was any indication. You are dining with Prince Cooper, Chandler, Prince Sebastian, and Prince Adam along with his mother and two older brothers. She is Queen Samantha of the Crawfords and they are Prince Arnold (aged 19) and Prince Andrew (aged 17). They are all very excited to meet you, of course. I will also be at the lunch table, purely because of my theoretical solution to Sebastian’s problem. And put on different clothes before you come to eat. We can’t have our prince be distracted from his important political duties because I won’t be able to resist you in your lace-up breeches and vest, can we?_ _—Kurt_

  
Blaine places it back on the table and turns appraisingly to his closet. This was going to be interesting.  
  
-  
  
“I hope you weren’t waiting too long for me,” Blaine says, entering the main dining hall and seeing the eight others all already seated. The only empty space is between Cooper at the head of the table and Kurt, who turns to him with an expectant smile.  
  
First, of course, he shakes hands with Queen Samantha—a lovely blond woman with a short frame that seems to be inherited by all three of her present sons—then gets clapped on the back by Arnold, who is nearly ripping his tunic open with how barrel-chested he is. Finally Andrew, the only black-haired child, who is slim and wearing a serious expression, shakes his hand firmly, steel eyes staring at him with almost bored curiosity.  
  
“Pleasure to meet you, Prince Blaine,” he says, and Blaine takes his place next to Kurt.  
  
“Would you lead us in prayer, Queen Samantha?” Cooper requests, as is customary, and she nods.  
  
“Dear gods, please bless the food before us, the friends beside us, and the love between us,” Queen Samantha recites, smiling openly at everyone round the table. “Can someone please pass the corn?”  
  
Mercedes and the other kitchen staff have prepared a lovely meal of grilled chicken, corn on the cob, and fresh garden salad, and no one hesitates to dig in. Kurt and Chandler do eat somewhat stiffly, as they are unaccustomed to dining with royals, but once Cooper scarfs down his entire ear of corn in under thirty seconds and then, without pause, nearly swallows a drumstick whole, they seem a bit more relaxed about the whole affair.  
  
Of course, another reason why Kurt is eating slowly is because he is working through the meal with only his right hand—his left shifts higher and higher on Blaine’s thigh, always averting its path as soon as Blaine thinks he’s going to touch his clothed cock. Chandler is sitting opposite them and spends more time glaring surreptitiously at Kurt and chewing his bottom lip than he does chewing his food. Blaine would probably care more if Kurt wasn’t tracing the seams of his breeches at every given moment.  
  
The eating does dwindle down, though, and soon Cooper clinks his spoon on his water glass—despite the fact that few are still eating and literally no one is talking. “Alright, so you all know, we’re here to discuss Prince Sebastian’s situation primarily, not just to make merry and eat.”  
  
Kurt’s hand drops to Blaine’s knee, giving it a comforting squeeze as Blaine’s entire body is suddenly shaking almost imperceptibly. “You okay?” he says directly into Blaine’s ear, eyes still focused on Cooper, who is outlining things about Sebastian that everyone already knows. Blaine shakes his head minutely.  
  
“Look at Sebastian,” he says out of the corner of his mouth. The submissive prince is seated next to Adam. He seems ready to vanish into thin air. Adam is whispering something softly to him, but Sebastian still looks like he’s going to throw up.  
  
“Cooper,” Blaine says sudden and loud, “you don’t need to debrief everyone of what we know. I would like to say, however, that Kurt here has proposed a theory and possible solution to the predicament in which we are currently entangled. May I invite him to speak?”  
  
Cooper’s mouth jerks into a forced half-smile. “Of course. Kurt?”  
  
Blaine is no longer shaking, so Kurt takes that to mean he really should say something. “Well, after her two miscarriages and one girl, King James had decided he’d had enough of his wife. He banished her to the same forest to which he had banished the girl. My theory stands thus: that Prince Sebastian’s mother found her daughter and proceeded to raise her in the countryside. However, if King James had discovered what I believe to be true about his daughter, he certainly would not have abandoned her—no, he would not have even let her live. Queen Millicent took on the guise of a poor maiden in the countryside, eventually altering her appearance and finding a job amongst the strolling players so she could support her daughter. She even changed her name to something that emulated the job she’d found among the players: Carole. A few years later, however, she found a man with whom she wanted to spend the rest of her life, a widower who already had a son from his previous wife. This man’s name was Burt Hummel, and I was his son.”  
  
Blaine turns to face Kurt in shock. “You mean—”  
  
“Let Kurt finish, Blainey,” Cooper says, the contorted expression on his face giving away that he had actually been absorbing Kurt’s story.  
  
“My birth mother was Elizabeth Hummel,” Kurt continues, “but my step-mother was Queen Millicent—also known as Carole. She and Burt had two boys together. The younger of them is named Finn. He’s in the Crawford kingdom now, I believe, living with the same group of nomadic strolling players my step-mother had first joined in the countryside. Anyway, my older step-sister was eventually marked as submissive. Her name is Marley, and she is currently living in my childhood home in the Anderson kingdom countryside with her dominant, a very close friend of mine named Kitty.”  
  
There seems to be a collective intake of breath round the table as Kurt locks eyes with Sebastian, who’s been fidgeting in his seat as he’s taken in the story like the rest of them.  
  
“Your mother, Queen Millicent, was banished from the kingdom. But your father still needed a male dominant with a royal bloodline. He said that if she gave birth to a boy while in the countryside, he had to be given to back to the Smythe kingdom. Well, you were born with her and Burt and you were sent back to the kingdom. One of your father’s mistresses was with you when you got marked as submissive. She filled in your circle, saving your life. It was this mistress who you called mother for the majority of your life, who currently reigns as queen in the Smythe kingdom.”  
  
Sebastian looks at Kurt with strange, round eyes. “Can I—can I just, um, repeat it back to make sure—that I understand?”  
  
Kurt nods.  
  
“So my dad and my mom have two miscarriages and then they have a girl, and since girls can’t rule kingdoms—at least, my dad wouldn’t allow a girl to rule his kingdom—she gets tossed in the woods. Then my dad throws my mom out in the woods too on the condition that if she has baby that’s a boy, he keeps it. She wants away from him so she agrees and raises Marley in the countryside. Then she meets your dad and they have me. I go back to the kingdom and my, uh, step-mom fills in my circle when I get it so it looks like I’m dominant. Why didn’t they send Finn back, too?”  
  
“Because you were born first,” Kurt replies. “My dad was really upset that Carole sent you back to the kingdom. But she said that King James would’ve found you anyway. He had spies. They would’ve taken you forcefully if she hadn’t willingly let you go.”  
  
Sebastian nods, saddened. “Yeah—yeah, that sounds like him.”  
  
“I didn’t know if I’d ever see you again,” Kurt says. “I didn’t even know what you’d be called—Carole didn’t want to name you, she said that if she did it would it more difficult to give you up, not to mention King James would’ve changed the name if he didn’t like it.”  
  
“Wait, wait, wait,” Blaine interrupts, still having trouble processing all of the information. “So—so Kurt is Sebastian’s older brother?”  
  
Kurt gets up from his seat and walks around the table until Sebastian is standing up next to him. He pulls his younger brother into a crushing embrace, and turns Sebastian’s face away from the staring table when he starts to cry and hug Kurt back.  
  
Cooper rings a bell, drawing Mercedes to the room. “Yes, Prince Cooper?”  
  
“Could you bring out dessert, please?” Blaine is shocked to realize that this is Cooper’s attempt to draw attention away from the overemotional reunited brothers. He hadn’t known Cooper could display that kind of tact.  
  
Mercedes leaves and returns in less than a minute bearing a monstrous chocolate cake, decorated with icing frills and frosting flowers. “Enjoy!”  
  
Sebastian’s smile is watery when he sits down, Kurt back at his seat next to Blaine. “I think I’ll pass on the cake. I’ve had enough sweetness for today.”  
  
-  
  
“You said you had a solution to Sebastian’s being submissive, though,” Cooper restarts the conversation after everyone (even Sebastian) has had at least one piece of the decadent cake on their plates.  
  
Kurt nods. “Oh, yes. I was thinking that Prince Adam could claim Sebastian after his sickness ended—” Adam chokes around his mouthful of cake—“and then he would live in the Crawford kingdom. His father couldn’t touch him there unless he wanted to start a war.”  
  
Sebastian’s nose wrinkles. “You haven’t met my father, Kurt. He—he doesn’t take to not getting his way very well. I wouldn’t put it past him to start a war with the Crawfords, probably under some preposterous claim that they’d kidnapped me.” Adam dips his head in acknowledgment.  
  
“I hate to play devil’s advocate, but he has a point,” Blaine says, frowning. “King James visited the kingdom when I was very young, and he—he left a mark on us, certainly.”  
Cooper snorts. “A mark on the castle, anyway. If you look closely enough in the Great Hall you can still see where he punched the wall.”  
  
“A man of temper, that one,” Queen Samantha muses, and Kurt turns to her expectantly. She and her sons had been silent all of the meal, but he knew she was no fool. She’d been listening more intently to Kurt’s story than anyone.  
  
“What do you propose, Queen Samantha?” he says carefully.  
  
She’s silent a moment, and Andrew puts a hand on his mother’s wrist. “If I may speak?”  
  
It’s not a question, but Cooper says, “Go on.”  
  
Chandler perks up from his corner of the table where he’s been sending stormy looks everywhere but Blaine’s direction.  
  
“What Mother and Arnold and I spoke of on the carriage ride here, I know she is reluctant to say. It’s rather farfetched, after all. But what Kurt has revealed only serves to strengthen our solution. Have you considered combining the Crawford kingdom and the Smythe kingdom?”  
  
Arnold glares at his younger brother. “I thought we decided to not speak of that!”  
  
“Think about it, Arnold,” Andrew argues. “If Adam and Prince Sebastian enter a claim, well, we already know Adam’s inheriting the throne. Since there are no other dominant male heirs to the Smythe kingdom, why doesn’t Adam just rule both?”  
  
“I think you should perhaps let Adam speak on that one before anything is decided,” Sebastian says, glancing at his dominant’s shocked face. “Did you tell him any of this before?”  
  
“All I knew,” says Adam, his accent growing stronger in his emotion, “was that I was heir to my father’s throne. Not that I was to rule _two kingdoms_!”  
  
“They wouldn’t be two kingdoms,” Andrew says. “They’d be combined as one. King James is weary of rule, I know. Why else would he be so set on having an heir? He wants out of the throne and into the gloried old retirement age. You’re of age, Adam—”  
  
“Barely!” Adam spits. “If you want the two kingdoms to be combined so badly, why don’t you rule them? Why are you putting all this on me?”  
  
“Because you’re responsible,” Arnold says from where he’s been pushing cake around his plate. “That’s why Mother wanted you to rule the kingdom in the first place. It’s why Prince Blaine is likely to inherit his deceased father’s throne, as a matter of fact. Men like Andrew, Prince Cooper, and I—we’re not meant to rule, Adam. You’re a natural, a male, and a dominant. How could King James deny you the privilege?”  
  
Adam falls silent.  
  
Cooper’s mouth works for a moment, and then he says, “What do you mean, I’m not meant to rule? Father said specifically that he wanted me to inherit the throne.”  
  
“No, he didn’t,” Blaine says. “He said he wanted me _not_ to rule. Because he was a prejudiced bas—” Kurt cuts him off with a loud coughing fit. “I mean,” Blaine says over Kurt’s strained noises, “he didn’t like submissives, Coop. It’s not that he didn’t want me ruling the kingdom, really—he didn’t want a _submissive_ ruling.”  
  
Cooper mulls this over, face strangely guarded. “Huh. So he’s like King James?”  
  
Sebastian nods. “Blaine and I have been talking about this, actually. Our fathers are both righteous bastards.”  
  
Cooper makes as if to say something, then shuts his mouth. Queen Samantha looks up from where she and her three sons have been engaged in quiet discussion. Kurt notices Adam is staring at his lap, face darkened, determined.  
  
“My son, Adam, has accepted his position. As soon as Prince Sebastian has finished his sickness and been claimed by Adam, us four are going to propose the solution to King James.”  
  
“Actually,” Sebastian says, “could I come, too? I have to get back to my kingdom anyway—and I know how to deal with my father better than any of you.”  
  
A servant suddenly rushes into the room, and Cooper stands to receive the scroll of paper that he bears. The servant bows at the waist and bustles back out as Cooper unfurls the parchment. “It’s a notice from the Smythe kingdom of the North,” he says, brow knitting. “They’re requesting Prince Sebastian back immediately because of the tragedy that has occurred. King James has died.”

 


	9. chapter eight

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> warnings: should i give warnings for really weird headspaces and total mental breakdowns? i don't know. i guess i just did. this chapter is, in fact, sort of just one long mental breakdown. well shit. i actually just noticed that. oops?

_Dear Prince Sebastian,_  
  
 _I hope that this reaches you and the Crawfords well. I just wanted to write to let you know that no matter what happens, you are welcome and safe in the Anderson kingdom. Blaine would have written to tell you this himself, except that he is busied with the legal affairs of his kingdom as he prepares his official announcement to be presented a few weeks from now—the one in which he declares that Prince Cooper has passed the throne on to him, and that he is accepting his position as king. I do hope everything works out in your kingdom—because your father is no longer a factor in your life, making your submissive status easier, I feel that everything should fall into place._  
  
 _But I am also writing to tell you of your father’s mistress, Queen Helena, who saved your life when you got your mark and who has been reigning queen ever since. That woman, you may know, is made to rule. I know—as do you—that Prince Adam mainly consented to ruling the two kingdoms because he did not want to let down his mother and because he felt there truly was no other option. But consider this woman, Prince Sebastian. We here in the Anderson Kingdom have done our research, and, if Queen Helena consents to the idea of the Crawford and Smythe kingdoms becoming one, Prince Adam will have a world of burden removed from his young shoulders._  
  
 _Of course I wish you luck and hope for the best no matter the circumstances. Oh—and do tell Prince Andrew that he needs to write me soon, for more personal matters._  
  
 _Sincerely,_  
  
 _Chandler M. Kiehl_  
  
 _Tutor, Legal Coordinator, 3rd Rank Guard, and Advisor to the Royals at Anderson Palace_  
  
-  
  
Kitty slows her mare to a halt at the front of the Anderson palace and feels Marley do the same beside her. They’ve been personally called to the cityside of the kingdom for the first time in their lives, and it’s not a little strange.  
  
Even more odd is the fact that not Kurt, but a stranger named Chandler (apparently a ‘tutor, legal coordinator, 3rd rank guard, and advisor to the royals’ at the palace) had invited them hither. But Kitty knows better than to refuse an invitation to the palace. She’ll have Kurt to know here if no one else, and Marley always by her side.  
  
Now she looks at her not-really submissive, who is dismounting their fourth-best horse and holding a carrot to its mouth. Marley’s hair is loose and free around her mid-back. Her green corset is cinched perfect and proper, a neat bow tied at its base, and she smiles with a light in her eyes that Kitty has been missing for too long. She takes a moment to admire the woman below her—as the moment Kitty dismounts she will be shorter than Marley—and finds her face joyful, happy in a way that Kitty can no longer make her.  
  
“Marley,” she says, dismounting reluctantly, and the warm green eyes gazing at her will never grow old.  
  
“Yes, ma’am?”  
  
“Will you tie the horses up and let me go in ahead of you?” It’s not an order, as it once would’ve been. Things are stiff between them now, even as Marley’s smile burns willfully oblivious through it all, even as Kitty has made her apologies and Marley has let herself be dominated again. It’s—hesitant, rebuilding, relearning. It’s careful and frightening and wanting everything to be right, knowing that it may not be. Knowing that it may never be again.  
  
But Marley bows her head, a confirmation though as her smile wanes. “Yes, ma’am.”  
  
Something strange moves darkly in Kitty’s chest. “Marley—” Her voice catches on the word, breaks. “Look at me.”  
  
It’s not a command, because Kitty doesn’t trust herself to make those orders anymore, but she does earn a gaze so full of apprehension she could cry.  
  
“Call me Kitty,” she says, and searches Marley’s eyes for understanding. Not an order, never an order—maybe things will never be like that between them again, maybe she needs to let go, maybe they both need more than they can provide for each other. She is about to go into the Anderson palace, and she refuses to cry.  
  
“Yes,” Marley says on an exhale of breath. “Yes, Kitty.”  
  
-  
  
Cooper paces, reaches the end of the room, pivots, paces back. This room, the Great Hall, the first place people come in when entering the palace, is twenty measly paces across. Of course, Cooper’s strides are long. He hears Chandler say “I’m letting down the drawbridge for our guests” but he does not hear him say it. He pivots, graceful as ever, paces back. Precision is key. Precision is the key for keeping yourself together when everything you thought you knew is falling apart. Cooper needs control—to control—to be in control. He needs a sub.  
  
“Prince Cooper!”  
  
The voice is sharp, demands his attention. He jerks out of his trancelike pace and sees Chandler, spectacles on the bridge of his nose, rubbing his forehead with his palm.  
  
“Please greet your guests when I open the door.” He must look as blank as he feels, because Chandler softens and sighs. “Lady Kitty of the Wilde Family, and Lady Marley of the Rose-Hudson family.” He opens the door and in steps a short blond woman—the second one he’s had to deal with in this blasted week. But she is no submissive like Queen Samantha, though her eyes are strangely watery and her face slightly blotchy, she stands with her feet shoulder-width apart and with her hands barely curled at her sides, she is a dom.  
  
“Lady Kitty of—” Chandler begins, and she holds up a hand immediately.  
  
“No, no, no, none of that,” she scowls, making Chandler slink back behind Cooper. “I’m not one of your fancy lords or ladies, I’m just Kitty. Hello, Prince Cooper, it appears you weren’t expecting me. What kind of tutor, legal coordinator, 3rd rank guard, and advisor to the royals at the Anderson palace doesn’t tell his prince that he’s having company? I assume you’re Chandler,” she says, bypassing Cooper completely after acknowledging him. “Are you not?”  
  
“I am, Miss,” Chandler says timidly, pushing his spectacles further onto his nose with one hand. “But I assure you we were both expecting you, it’s just been a very harrowing last few days—um, if I may ask, where is Lady Marley of the Rose-Hudson family?”  
  
“She’ll be along in a moment,” Kitty says, and something in her face relaxes with the mention of Marley—then tenses up twice as hard again. “So, Lord Chandler of the Kiehls,” she says mockingly, “why am I here? What do you need me for? I suppose my services are free, considering I’m no longer an attached dominant—”  
  
“Nothing like that, I assure you,” Chandler says hurriedly. “Has Kurt kept you up to date on the palace news?”  
  
Kitty scoffs. “If he had any time between fucking Blaine and fucking Blaine, I’m sure he would.”  
  
Chandler’s face goes resolutely blank. Cooper recognizes the expression from when he had first suspected that Kurt had dominated Blaine. “Well, do you know about Marley’s relation to Kurt and to Prince Sebastian of the Smythe Kingdom?”  
  
Kitty’s face, if possible, sours further. “Indeed. They’re all siblings in one way or another. With the same hair, eyes, and stature, I was pleasantly unsurprised. Now, will you stop stumbling around the actual reason I’m here and just tell me?”  
  
Chandler rubs a hand over his forehead and Cooper hears his exhale. “It’s not actually you, Miss Kitty, that we wanted. It’s your submissive.”  
  
“Marley—” Kitty’s face crumples and, for a split second, is so sad that it breaks Cooper’s heart to look at her. He didn’t know it was still possible for him to channel such emotions. Cooper files the feeling away for future reference—maybe for when Blaine finally leaves the palace with Kurt and gives the throne to him?—and Kitty’s angry mask is back on. “Marley is not my submissive. I guess—I guess Kurt didn’t tell you.”  
  
Chandler didn’t notice the change in Kitty’s demeanor as far as Cooper can tell. He’s still radiating his annoyance, but at Kurt’s name he appears to have reached his defeat. “Look—Kitty—if it’s anything to you, we didn’t ask Kurt about you and Marley recently. He mentioned it a few months back, and I assumed—and I’m sorry.”  
  
“Fat lot of good that does me,” Kitty snaps. Someone raps on the door quietly. “Oh—that will be her knocking now, then. I’d best get out of your way.”  
  
She turns on her heel and flees in the direction of the kitchens before anyone can stop her.  
  
Chandler attempts to exchange a glance with Cooper, who has returning to pacing.  
  
“You’ll drive yourself insane if you keep doing that,” Chandler says without thinking, and Cooper snorts.  
  
“Maybe I already am. Aha!” He stops in his tracks. The knocking has started up again, but neither man makes a move to get the door. “Insanity! What a genuine, valuable emotion. I can definitely use that sometime.”  
  
“I work for a nutcase,” Chandler says under his breath, and, as the knocking hesitantly grows louder, he goes and opens the door. “Lady Marley of the Rose-Hudsons! I’m afraid your—traveling companion has gone off, perhaps in search of Sir Kurt, the stablemaster, but—”  
  
“For god’s sake, I’m submissive, not daft,” the woman grouches, then covers her mouth with a hand. “I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean—it’s been a rough week, I’m sorry.” Her eyes are too much like Kurt’s. It hurts to look at them so sad and—almost scared, and, oh, but that’s how they’re different. Kurt is not—has never been afraid, Chandler knows. This woman—this girl—Marley, she wears her heart on her sleeve as much as he. But they are not the same.  
  
“I know she’s avoiding me,” Marley says as Chandler blinks a few times to get Kurt’s eyes out of his head. “I know—oh, you don’t care, I’m sorry.” She says this plaintively, not whiny or sarcastic, just helpless. “I suppose I should ask what I’m doing here?”  
  
Chandler nods. “Follow me, please.” He’ll lead her to a place with chairs to tell her all the news—he’s sure she’ll want to be sitting down.  
  
As they exit the room, Cooper buries his head in his hands and lets out a muffled cry. Submissives have their sicknesses and that’s all very well, but he’s been unattached for far too long. A dom has needs—and if he can’t find a girl to control, why can’t he have the kingdom?  
  
-  
  
Blaine buries his head in his hands and lets out a muffled cry. Kurt sits beside him on the bed and places a hand on his lower back. It’s grounding, but it’s temporary. The submissive prince lets himself shiver, then tremble, then full out shake.  
  
“Blaine. Blaine. _Blaine._ Blaine, focus. Can you hear me?”  
  
Kurt’s voice is floating somewhere to the left of his head, but he doesn’t know exactly where it is because he’s floating too, he doesn’t think he’s in subspace, but somewhere else, somewhere scary and unnatural and—and—  
  
“Blaine!”  
  
Kurt shoves him flat on his back and clambers on top of him till he’s covered Blaine entirely with his body. Oh, that’s a good weight. Blaine floats closer back to himself. Kurt laces their fingers together and brings Blaine’s hands over his head, pinning them there—and now Blaine is really, really back, because he can see Kurt’s beautiful eyes—today they’re green-gray—and oh god why is he upset why is Kurt upset Blaine can see that he’s upset see it in his eyes, green-gray tempest—can’t tell if sad or angry or disappointed— _upset_ —  
  
“I’m sorry, sweetheart,” Kurt says, letting Blaine tuck his head in the crook of his neck. “You were just—you weren’t— _there_ , and it was scaring me. I had to do something.”  
  
Blaine burrows his face further into where Kurt’s neck and shoulder meet. “Mmmpf.”  
  
“Blaine.” Kurt pulls back and looks at him seriously. “Are you okay?”  
  
Blaine nods, and Kurt’s frown deepens.  
  
“Answer me with words, Blaine. Are you okay?”  
  
Blaine opens and closes his mouth a few times before he produces coherent sound. “Not subspace.”  
  
“No, definitely not,” Kurt agrees, pressing their bodies closer. “Do you know what happened?”  
  
Blaine makes a lost noise. “…I remember scared, and scared, and no place to—to go, no place—so I just went…” He lifts his shoulder as much as he can in a half-shrug. “Away, I guess.”  
  
Kurt knocks their foreheads together gently. “Okay. So needing to talk to Cooper is really overwhelming you and scaring you, correct?”  
  
“Yes,” Blaine says, voice small, and for a moment Kurt worries he’ll leave again. “But—but it’s not something you can—it’s not something you can just fix. I know you want to tell him for me—” Kurt murmurs his assent—“but you can’t, Kurt, dealing with—this, with him, is something I need to do on my own.” Kurt leans down and seals their lips together, a spark of heat going through Blaine when their lips touch. He withholds his aroused shiver, because he’s afraid Kurt will mistake it for the bad one.  
  
“What was that for?” he says when Kurt draws back, a fond smile on his face.  
  
“Reward,” Kurt explains. “You knew what I wanted to do, but you know what you need to do, so you told me so. That’s good. You’re good.” He kisses Blaine again, open-mouthed and messy. “Sorry. Couldn’t resist.”  
  
“Do you see me complaining?” Blaine teases. “But—yeah. I know what I need to do, but that’s easier said than done.”  
  
Kurt nods thoughtfully. “Why is it so overwhelming? He seemed pretty accepting of it at the dinner we all had.”  
  
Blaine shakes his head. “That’s his neutral face, Kurt. His neutral face comes out when he’s hiding things.”  
  
“Not when he’s actually neutral?” Kurt says, befuddled.  
  
Blaine laughs. “You may work for him, but I grew up with him. Cooper is usually too busy pointing and turning and FEELING. VERY. STRONG. EMOTIONS. to have a neutral face. He only puts it on when he’s trying to not feel anything, and that means he doesn’t like me taking the throne.”  
  
“But he’s got to understand if you just explain it,” Kurt says. “Right?”  
  
Blaine scrunches his mouth up. “Right. Sure. If he was logical. But he’s Cooper. I mean, one of the first memories I have with him is when he took my stuffed animal bird as a child, and he kept holding it over his head and laughing at me because when I tried to jump for it I couldn’t reach. And I remember, I said, ‘That’s not fair!’ And he said, ‘Life’s not fair.’”  
  
Kurt’s eyes are still clouded with confusion. “I thought that was normal for an older sibling to do.” Blaine tilts his head.  
  
“You never did that to Finn or Marley when you three were growing up, did you?”  
  
“Well… no, but we were all basically best friends, which does not sound like you and Cooper.”  
  
“And another memory, when I was five, my mom was singing a song and my dad was playing the lute. Cooper and I were dancing to the music, but he made fun of me and said I couldn’t dance. And I’d just learned to walk two years ago!”  
  
Kurt grins. “I’m sure you were a wonderful dancer even as a child, beautiful. But are you sure that wasn’t just you being the tiny drama queen you are?”  
  
Blaine slumps. “Okay, so maybe I’ve overthinking it.”  
  
“I think you’re _definitely_ overthinking it,” Kurt says. “I mean, I do understand you’re nervous. And okay, maybe he will be put out about it. But like you say, it’s Cooper. He gets over things twice as fast as he makes a mountain out of a molehill.”  
  
There’s a sudden rapping at the door and Kurt springs off of Blaine to grab a book. Blaine goes to open the door. “Yes?”  
  
Chandler pokes his head in and raises an eyebrow at Kurt pretending to be in very deep thought over a page he’d opened to a second before. Blaine clears his throat.  
  
“Yes, Chandler?”  
  
The tutor gives him a sympathetic glance. “You might want to go comfort Cooper. He’s nearly pulling out hairs because of the rumors around the palace you’re going to take over the throne. And Kurt, Lady Kitty and Lady Marley are here and requesting your presence.”  
  
Blaine’s face has gone white with shock by the end of the first sentence. When his eyes start to fill up with tears Kurt’s right there, shooing Chandler off, pulling Blaine back and whispering in his ear. “Blaine, Blaine, you’re going to be okay, you’re going to go and tell him everything you detailed to me and everything’s going to be okay, do you understand?” Blaine blinks once, twice, and the tears are gone.  
  
He leans into Kurt’s embrace and says, “Yes, sir. I understand.”  
  
Kurt’s smile could light the night sky better than the stars. “Good boy. I’m going to see Kitty and Marley, and you can meet us in my quarters after you’ve spoken to Cooper, alright?” Blaine nods and Kurt gives him a hard, chaste kiss: a reward. “I love you.”  
  
And with that, he’s out the door, leaving Blaine with a shocked face and an aching mouth.  
  
-  
  
Blaine finds Cooper in his bedroom, pacing. Gods. The last time he’d seen Cooper pacing was after their father had passed. This was not good.  
  
“Coop?”  
  
“Blainey!” Cooper exclaims, shutting the door for Blaine and motioning for them to sit in the two armchairs in his room. “Thank the gods. But I know what you’re going to say. You’re sorry about the dinner and the rumors and everything about the throne and are going to leave me my rightful place, thank—”  
  
“Cooper,” Blaine says, tries to make his voice as steady as possible, “I’m taking the throne.”  
  
“What?” Cooper sits straight up in his chair. “Oh, gods, no.”  
  
“Cooper,” Blaine says again, pleading. “I have to.”  
  
Of all the things Blaine isn’t expecting Cooper to do—he laughs.  
  
Blaine can take the shouting. He can take the shouting, the screaming, the crying, the pointing—he has had all the negative emotions in the world taken out on him time and time again, and he knows how to deal with them, he knows how to soothe their pains.  
  
But laughter—laughter cuts like a knife.  
  
“Cooper?” he tries, but his voice is too small, too weak, and Cooper continues to laugh maniacally. It subsides into a giggly hiccupping fit and then goes to full-out mad cackling all over again. Cooper, Blaine notices, is shaking.  
  
“Cooper?”  
  
Cooper wipes his eyes with the back of his hand and grins broadly, shaking his head. “‘I _have_ to,’” he mocks in a terrible imitation of Blaine’s voice. “Cooper, Cooper, you don’t _understand_. I _have_ to!” For a moment Blaine thinks his brother is going to lose it and start laughing all over again, but he gathers himself and turns serious. “Blaine, you don’t understand. _I_ have to.”  
  
“I know it’s what Father wanted,” Blaine says, starting in with his defense, “but—”  
  
Cooper guffaws. “You think this is still about Father? You think this is still about Father! I don’t give a damn about Father and what he wanted for this kingdom, Blainey, I really don’t. But you don’t _have_ to do anything—you don’t have to control something, you don’t have that need, that desire, Blaine. You’re a _submissive_.”  
  
Blaine doesn’t understand, he doesn’t get it. Here is his brother, saying that he doesn’t care about their father’s wishes. Here is his brother, still denying Blaine the throne because he’s submissive. Blaine doesn’t _understand._ Stupid, hot tears start to fall from his eyes. But Cooper isn’t finished.  
  
“Oh, poor, poor, Blainey. Crying because he can’t get his way. Crying because he’s found everything he’s ever wanted and dumb big brother Cooper won’t give him one last little thing!”  
  
Blaine freezes, tears dripping from his chin. “What did you say?”  
  
Cooper ignores him. “Crying because I thought we were on the same _side_ , Cooper, we’re _brothers,_ Cooper, and crying because he can’t understand the needs of a dominant!”  
  
Oh. _Oh._  
  
“You need to be in control,” Blaine says, and for the first time in this whole conversation, something makes sense. “You’re a dominant. You need to be in _control_.”  
  
Cooper stops ranting and stares at him. “Oh, gods.” And now _he’s_ crying, and Blaine realizes that for all they’ve suffered with and against each other, he has never seen his brother cry.  
  
“I’m sorry,” Cooper says, voice choked. “I’m so sorry, Blaine, oh gods, I’m sorry—”  
  
Blaine doesn’t know what to do. He would comfort Cooper, but Cooper’s a dominant, so doesn’t he need to con—  
  
“Please,” Cooper says. His arms are held out, and he looks irrevocably broken. “Please.”  
  
And Blaine understands. And he knows what to do.  
  
He gets Cooper to his feet and collapses into his brother’s embrace. Cooper’s shaking still, body racking with sobs and hiccups and stuttering breaths every few moments, but he’s holding Blaine tight and Blaine _understands_.  
  
“You can have the kingdom, Cooper,” he says, looking up at his brother’s watery eyes and trembling chin. “You can have the kingdom, you can have the throne. I understand now. I’m sorry.”  
  
Cooper makes a noise that sounds a bit like a laugh, and he fixes his arms on Blaine’s back. “It’s the stupidest thing, Blaine. All of this about submissive sickness, and submissive needs this, and submissive needs that. Sometimes I think dominant needs are just swept under the rug, you know?”  
  
Blaine is no dominant, that’s for sure.  
  
But he knows.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tonight is a double update night because i need the distraction... come to think of it, today has been one long mental breakdown for me too.


	10. chapter nine

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> *marina dimandis voice* sex sex sex (yeah) sex sex sex (yeah)
> 
> ((warnings for rimming and spanking, and also talk of kurt's exes.))

 

Blaine bursts into the stablemaster’s quarters and immediately finds Kurt, who’s boiling tea over the stove. “Kurt, Kurt, about what you said, what you told me—”

Kurt raises an eyebrow and jerks his head slightly back at the kitchen table, where Kitty and Marley are staring at Blaine in confusion.

“Oh.” He bows to them both, earning polite nods and smiles. “I’m—um, I’m Prince Blaine, and you two must be Lady Kitty and Lady Marley.”

“Just call them Kitty and Marley,” Kurt says, pouring the steaming tea into mugs and setting them in front of the women. “Would you like some tea?”

“Yes, please,” Blaine says. “May I--?” He gestures to a chair, and Marley pulls it out for him.

Kitty, the blond one, is studying him with a strange smile. He meets her gaze uneasily, and her grin only broadens. “So, Kurt, this is the little prince you’ve found to bend over tables and—”

“Kitty!” Kurt hisses, setting a cup of tea in front of Blaine and seating himself at the table. Blaine feels a flush simmering on his neck. Kurt’s hand is on his—well, saying it’s on his knee would be a stretch. It’s on his very upper thigh, and so close where Blaine always wants Kurt to touch him, and—oh dear gods _that’s_ why Kurt left a hickey there.

“Is this the color he turns when you mark him, too?” Kitty continues, smirking. “All dark pink?”

Kurt’s nostrils are literally flaring. “Kitty. Behave yourself.”

It’s an order, though she is clearly a dominant as well, and Blaine holds his breath as the tension in the room grows so thick it’d have to be cut with a meat knife.

After a long silent moment, Kitty looks away. “Fine. Whatever. Nice to meet you, Blaine.”

Kurt’s index finger and thumb pinch the hickey on Blaine’s inner thigh through the thin layer of his breeches, and he tries to not yelp at the arousing pain. Even after the pain has subsided, Kurt keeps pushing his thumb into where he knows the mark is while carrying on small talk with Kitty and sipping his tea one-handedly, and Blaine is still as stone. He fears that if he moves, Kitty will somehow know what’s happening—she seems to be one of those people—and—

“Blaine?” Kurt’s eyes are on him, expectant, but Blaine has only been focusing on the hand on his thigh and not the actual conversation.

“Um.”

Kurt’s eyes sparkle with mischief, but the rest of his face betrays nothing. “I asked how your talk with Cooper went, sweetheart.”

Blaine puts a hand on his teacup, which is still too hot for him to really drink. “I’m giving him the throne like Father wanted.”

“What?” Kurt’s mouth is gaping, and the hand on Blaine’s thigh is still in his shock. “I know Cooper can be stubborn as hell, but you can’t just let him—”

“He’s not taking advantage of me, Kurt,” Blaine says, forcefully placid. Getting angry at Kurt is never a good idea. “I listened to his side of the story, and he really needs this.”

Kurt’s mouth shuts abruptly only to open again. “All right, at least tell me what on earth could’ve changed your mind.”

“He’s an unattached dominant,” Blaine says. “It’s—it’s getting difficult for him to, er, be in control of himself when he can’t—when he doesn’t have anyone or anything to control. He needs to be in charge of something, Kurt.”

“Can’t you just find him a sub, then?” Kitty cuts in. “I mean, I totally get the whole unattached dominant thing, I mean, I am one, but like—”

Blaine smiles sadly. “Cooper has been looking for the right girl since he got his mark. If he hasn’t found one in the last five years, I don’t think he’s going to find one anytime soon. But,” he says, interrupting Kurt before he can speak, “we made a bargain. If he ever does find a submissive and I still want to rule, I’ve got the kingdom.”

Kurt is frowning, and his hand has migrated to Blaine’s waist, where it is most certainly more visible, but Blaine can’t bring himself to care. “So… it’s like a compromise?”

“Yes, exactly,” Blaine says. “It’s a win-win, as far as I’m concerned. Kurt, I love—I love that you want me to be the first submissive ruler, your confidence in me—it helps a lot. But I’m sixteen. I may legally be an adult, but I still feel like a kid half the time. I’ve got more to learn before I can rule my kingdom, but once I am able, I swear I will be the best king this kingdom’s ever had.”

Kurt’s hand squeezes Blaine’s hip, and he smiles. “Better than Cooper?”

“ _Much_ better than Cooper.”

-

His sickness may be over, but Blaine is still horny—or just horribly aroused because he’s been watching Kurt ride around the stables, entranced by how in control he is of his horse and how the whip flicks over the mare’s hide.

(Okay, so maybe it’s just that Kurt’s _really_ good at what he does, but it’s also the fact that he’s wielding a riding crop while doing it that goes straight to Blaine’s cock.)

So when Kurt dismounts from Beth’s back and smirks down at where Blaine’s erection is showing through his trousers, he barely pauses before blurting, “I want you to spank me.”

Kurt’s eyes go wide, and then his pupils dilate so far it makes Blaine’s head spin.

“On your knees. Right now.”

Sam, Ryder, and Jake are in the other half of the stable, in the barn feeding the chickens and goats. They won’t see him. But the thrill—Blaine feels himself pulse hard in his pants as he hits the ground. Kurt smiles, strokes a hand over Blaine’s cheekbone.

“Good boy. You’re so beautiful like this.”

He thumbs over Blaine’s eyelashes, presses at his racing pulse in his throat gently, before settling a strong, warm hand at the base of Blaine’s neck.

“What do you want me to spank you with, gorgeous?”

Blaine whines. He hadn’t even thought that far ahead. The whip scares him a little too much to actually have someone use it on him, even if that someone is Kurt, who he trusts with his life—there’s a small black flogger hanging on the side of the stable, and Kurt follows his gaze to look at it.

“You want that?”

Blaine nods, hesitant.

“What’s wrong, sweetheart?” Kurt says, sensing his reluctance. “Change of mind?”

Blaine shudders. The thought of being spanked still turns him on much more than it probably should, but—he concentrates on the sensation of being gripped by the back of his neck, like how the barn cats hold their newborn kittens. It makes him feel safe. It makes him feel loved.

“Can we go to your quarters?”

-

Being on the bed where he took Blaine’s first from him will never fail to get Kurt hard—which is a bit troublesome when he’s trying to sleep. But right now he’s sitting on his bed, his submissive over his lap, Blaine’s pants yanked down to his knees to expose the lush fullness of his round tan cheeks. After laboring over the question, Blaine had decided that he just wanted Kurt’s hand on his bare skin to start, and Kurt had rewarded him with wet kisses all over his face and chest. That had gotten them both fully hard in the process—between Kurt biting at Blaine’s nipples and Blaine making soft mewling noises—but even now Kurt is feeling Blaine’s uncertainty.

The muscles of his lower back and ass are all clenched up and tense, and where his face is turned against the bed, Kurt can see him blushing.

“Are you scared, beautiful?”

Blaine shakes his head, mouth working but words not coming.

“Are you upset?”

Another headshake no.

“Are you nervous?”

Blaine burrows his head further into the sheets, but the flush crawling lower on his shoulders and chest speaks for him.

“Why’s that, then? You need to relax for me.” Kurt palms the fat cheeks in front of him and smoothes his hands over Blaine’s ass. “Are you self-conscious? You know I think you’re beautiful. This gorgeous ass, your entire body—you’re so lovely.”

Blaine shakes his head, words muffled by the comforter. “Kurt—I—” He’s blushing darker red, but at least he’s talking. Kurt resists the urge to dip his fingers between Blaine’s cheeks and tease.

“Yes, sweetheart?”

“I’mreallyturnedonandI’mafraidI’mgonnacome.”

Blaine’s words all jumble out in one breath, but Kurt gets the gist of it. He can’t help but laugh a little. “That’s what you’re all worked up for, mm?” This time he does run a finger along Blaine’s crack, light but there. Blaine squirms under him.

“ _Kurt_. I don’t wanna come too soon, please.” His voice is all choked up with arousal, poor thing. Kurt considers his options.

“Do you want to come and then let me spank you till you’re hard again?”

Blaine makes a noise that Kurt normally only hears from his agitated horses. “Oh, that’s it.” He finds Blaine’s hole with a finger and nudges the rim gently. Blaine shifts and glances back at Kurt, anticipation filling his features. “You may make as much noise as you want and move as much as you need. Come when you can, honey.” Kurt slides Blaine onto the bed and kneels up behind him, spreading his legs to settle between them. Blaine’s perfect ass is a temptation before him, one that Kurt doesn’t have to resist.

He starts at the last visible vertebrae of Blaine’s spine and seals his mouth over the knob. Blaine’s body jerks under him, muscled thighs clenching up and relaxing repeatedly. Kurt licks flat and broad over the dimples of Blaine’s back before finally spreading his cheeks a little and setting his mouth closing around his pucker, tongue dipping in every other harsh kiss to Blaine’s hole, making Blaine moan out through heavy panting.

“Oh, oh gods, oh gods, gods, that’s—so good, _gnnnnngh_.”

Here Blaine tastes bitter and sharp and like his silly scented body wash, like the soap that Kurt makes sure to clean him thoroughly with, ripe and barely sweet at all. Kurt loves doing this to him—and in honesty, he just loves _Blaine_ , every part of him, as his tiny hole spasms and clenches around Kurt’s tongue, it hits him harder than the time he got kicked in the shoulder by a frantic horse.

He supposes that he always did know. From the first time he had this lovely boy in his bed—the first time a sub is dominated, they are drawn to that dominant, and the first time a dom dominates they are drawn to that sub—

But Blaine is not Kurt’s first sub. His very first was Chandler, of course, and then there was Nick (though really he knows that he was Nick’s rebound from Jeff), and then Robert, then Elias—but none have been like Blaine. He has cared for them all, and even thought he loved some of them—none has he felt for then like he feels now for Blaine. He recalls the three words that slipped out before Blaine fell asleep, and then the same words that he said a few days ago before Blaine went to talk to Cooper—and sometimes it’s in the spur of the moment, when you don’t even have time to decide what you really want to do or say, that’s when the truth comes out.

It’s been like that since he first dominated Blaine, hasn’t it? A split second decision, and then something happens, something changes—

Blaine’s voice draws him from his thoughts, and Kurt realizes with a disappointed start that he actually missed him coming.

“Kurt, please, please spank me,” he’s saying, twitching his ass imperceptibly higher from the bed. “Please, sir, please, I’ve been good, please—”

Kurt brings his hand down hard on Blaine’s left cheek and hears the smack, hears his submissive—not his _submissive_ , but _his_ submissive—sob out something incoherent—

Brings his hand down again on Blaine’s other cheek, perfectly matching handprints, and then smacks him softer on the tops of his thighs, then harder again on his inner thighs where toothmarks and bites litter the smooth tan skin.

“Two more and I’ll make you come, sweetheart,” Kurt says quietly, bringing his palm down on the crack of Blaine’s ass and hearing him cry out for more even as his skin reddens and his body flinches away from the pain. “One more.” The last smack lands on the vertebrae that Kurt had been sucking on at the start. Blaine whines, moans.

“Kurt, Kurt, please kiss me.”

Kurt crawls up the bed and unbuttons Blaine’s shirt, flicking his tongue over his hard little nipples and wetting his chest hair. Blaine shoves the rest of his shirt off his shoulders and groans.

“Need, need your hand, please, sir—”

Kurt presses Blaine’s cock against his abdomen and jerks him harder, rougher than he probably should, Blaine slumping further into the bed and moaning loudly when he comes again. Kurt kisses his pink lips and, noticing it for the first time, traces the lines of his arms up to where his hands are clasped over his head.

“You’re so good,” he says, stroking Blaine still through the last spurts of come, till the submissive is twitching away from his hand.

“Too much,” Blaine whines, kissing Kurt all teeth and tongue and no grace. Kurt presses his hands above his head further back into the pillows.

“I love you,” he says, and Blaine’s eyes startle open.

“I—I love you too,” he says. “Sir— _Kurt_ —I don’t—”

Kurt leans down and kisses him long and sweet. “Love. _Blaine_.” Their lips pull apart with a smack. Blaine's eyes are wide and dilated. His mouth wears a little disbelieving smile.

“I don't ever know how I got so lucky, meeting you when I did.”

“Me neither,” Kurt breathes. He lets his full weight sink down on Blaine—the way they just fit together is something that will never be lost on him—and closes his eyes. Ever since his dad died, he hasn’t known another home. But this feels pretty damn close.

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ah yes. young love. nothing can /possibly/ go wrong.


	11. chapter ten

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> everyone has spies. everyone has sex. shit works itself out, kind of.
> 
> ((also, my precious child elliott gilbert makes his cameo in this chapter. i wonder if he'll stick around...))

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> SHIT MAN MY POSTING IS CATCHING UP WITH ME AND I REALLY NEED TO WRITE MORE ugh. BUT i really wanted to post this chapter tonight for new year's because of all the love and support and comments i've gotten on this story! and on sat/sun instead of a chapter update you'll get a sex scene that i deleted from this chapter :D this chapter is largely unbeta'd because i JUST remembered to email it to nora like...... five minutes ago........ (SORRY NORA)...... but yeah. i hope you guys had a fucking great 2014 and are ready to ring it in with some porn on saturday or sunday!

 

 

 

 

Chandler has been traveling for the last three days to the Smythe kingdom, and it is with a relieved sigh that he sees the sun setting rose and lavender over the unmistakable towers of the Smythe castle. They are taller than any other building he’s ever seen, even the pristine, cold grandeur of the Anderson palace is at least a story shorter than these stones. If it was possible to look like any building was trying too hard to be bigger and better than all, that building would be the picture of the Smythe castle.

But within this picturesque painting of perfection lies a dead king, his mistress, and son. There is no moat or drawbridge for Chandler to cross here, unlike the Anderson palace, instead there is an iron gate and a guard who gives him a weary look as Chandler explains his purpose for arriving and tells him that his horse will be seen to by a stable boy.

At the door, Chandler is greeted by an even-paler-than-usual Sebastian, flanked by Arnold and Adam, who are wearing matching worried expressions.

“Chandler,” Adam says, inclining his head. “Andrew’s expecting you in the guest quarters. Sebastian will accompany you there, if that’s alright.”

“Of course,” Chandler says, and follows the distraught prince down a hallway and up a flight of stairs. “How are things, Sebastian?”

The boy turns to him in despair. “How should I know? The man who has never really been a father to me has passed, and I am supposed to be at least some sort of upset. All I can think is what a great coincidence this is for the kingdoms, and what an opportunity it is to combine the Crawfords and Smythes for the better. Am I supposed to be sad? I know not how to feel.”

“How is your—Queen Helena?” Chandler says carefully. “She is who I did seek to speak to tonight.” Sebastian rolls his eyes.

“She claims to be in her mourning period and requests that no one enter her rooms. That’s why you’re seeing Andrew first, until I can get her in a better state of mind.”

“Do you really think she is upset?” Chandler has never met the woman, but he knows exactly what she is like by detailed accounts from his—acquaintances within the Smythe castle. She is an interesting one, that woman—never showing her real emotions, especially around King James. Chandler thinks that people in the Smythe castle rarely showed any emotion at all around him.

“I don’t _know_ ,” Sebastian says helplessly as they arrive at the door to the guest quarters. “Anyway, have a good talk with Andrew, or whatever you two are going to do.” Chandler turns to the prince with a start; Sebastian has an arched eyebrow and a smug expression.

“You’re not the only one with spies,” he says before leaving Chandler staring, speechless.

-

“Kurt,” Blaine calls, running over to his dominant despite the ache in his legs. He’s still sweaty and tense from fencing with Mike, who is far more graceful about the whole physically demanding affair than Blaine could ever hope to be. “Kurt, can we speak in your quarters?”

Kurt turns from speaking with Elliot, greeting Blaine with an open-mouthed kiss and a strong hand on his waist. “Of course, love. Do you want to speak or _speak_?” He winks, making Blaine blush and throw a glance behind him to Elliott, who has his hands in his pockets and is whistling too loudly as he walks away after mumbling something that sounds like 'use protection.'

“I—actually wanted to talk,” Blaine says, then lowers his voice. “After, you could perhaps give me a massage? I’m sore from fencing.”

“Perhaps I could make you sore from other things,” Kurt says, grinning and taking Blaine’s hand to lead him toward the stable. “What is it you wanted to talk about?”

Blaine swallows audibly, and his hand grows slippery in Kurt’s. “I—I wanted to set up a claim between us, now that my sickness is over. Only if you want to, of course. I mean—I don’t—want to force anything, you know. It’s—oh.” His rambling is cut off by Kurt pulling him in for a hard kiss that turns soft and messy when Blaine opens his mouth for it, grasping at Kurt’s jaw to try to get him closer.

“Of course I want you, love,” Kurt says. His hands are digging into the dimples of Blaine’s lower back with a fierce possession. “There is nothing I want more than a claim between us. Do we have Cooper’s blessing?” Blaine smiles against Kurt’s cheek.

“He gave it gladly. He says, and I quote, ‘You two were meant to be together. It’s sort of nice, in a disgustingly sweet way.’”

Kurt laughs. “Well, he’s not wrong. Speaking of Cooper and claims—we should start looking for girls for him. Have you anyone in mind?” Blaine’s brow furrows.

“I thought you might, as you know more of the outside world than I. I can’t think of anyone for him—the only women I know right now are taken, older, or homosexual.”

“Maybe he likes older women,” Kurt says with a shrug, making Blaine snort.

“Yeah, um, I don’t really want to think about Cooper’s preferences when we’re about to go write a claim.”

Kurt smiles and opens the door to his quarters for Blaine, squeezing his hand gently. “Go kneel next to my bed while I get some parchment and ink, love. We’ve got our work cut out for us.”

-

They are barely into Sebastian’s bedroom when Adam starts kissing down his chest and undoing the buttons of his shirt. Sebastian stumbles back onto his bed, laughing and squirming under Adam’s light touches.

“I’ve never seen anyone’s smile as lovely as yours,” Adam says, untying the laces of Sebastian’s breeches and pulling out his cock. He drops a quick kiss to its head before moving back up and pinning Sebastian’s hands over his head, looking down at him fondly.

“I’ve never really smiled before I met you,” Sebastian says quietly, arching up for a kiss. Adam lowers himself to fully cover Sebastian and gives him a sad look.

“Darling, I hope that’s not true.”

“But it is,” Sebastian protests, feeling himself start to go lax under Adam’s weight. “My childhood was just tight lips and getting hit if I spoke too much. When I became a teenager I acted out too much, vying for some positive attention. No one gave that much to me, even so. Maybe they knew I was faking it—my dominance, I mean. My father never figured it out, but then he never looked at me enough to really see past what I put on as a front. You are the first to really see me as me, I think.”

Adam drops his weight to Sebastian’s body, grounding him and letting him float all at once. He sucks a line of kisses down the submissive’s jaw and then stops, gazing into Sebastian’s blue-green eyes. “They want us to enter a claim, legally.”

Sebastian averts his eyes. “That they do.”

Adam brushes their lips together briefly, a comfort. “Come now, darling. Surely you have some opinion on the matter?”

“I don’t know,” Sebastian says staunchly. “I think—I don’t—it shouldn’t be done for politics, if anyone were to enter a claim. That is my opinion. And yours?”

“I agree,” says Adam. “I do. But—they want me to rule two kingdoms together. It’s—daunting. I wish I was not afraid.”

Sebastian reaches up a hand to tug Adam down and pull their bodies flush together. They release mutual sighs—Sebastian relaxed by the solid weight of his dominant, Adam relaxed by sinking his weight into his willing submissive. For a moment there was quiet, then Sebastian spoke.

“Have you considered finding someone else to rule?”

Adam snorts. “What do you mean? My obstinate brothers are set on me being the next king of whatever land they see fit for me to oversee. And who else would rule?”

“Chandler wrote me. It seems that my step-mother, Queen Helena, is a made ruler of her own. King James never did let her do much while he was alive. If she would see us sooner than later, everything may be set right.”

Adam blinks. “Queen Helena—I’d never considered. Do you really think she would take control of both kingdoms?”

Sebastian arches an eyebrow. “She filled in my open circle with black ink, but she filled in her closed circle with brown. You see?”

“She’s dominant,” Adam says, clarity in his eyes. “I do see.”

“We should speak with her at once,” Sebastian says, making to get up. “Let us not be deterred by her claims of mourning. She was always a wily one. I do love her as my mother still.”

Adam places a chiding hand on Sebastian’s chest and presses him gently back into his mattress. He grinds his hips down slow and hard, making Sebastian moan. “Patience, darling. I’ll see to her as soon as I’ve finished with you—and we’ve only just gotten started.”

-

“Hard limits?” Kurt says, fingers stroking through the hair at the base of Blaine’s skull. Blaine’s head has been heavy on his knee for the past ten minutes. They’ve decided to keep the wording of the claim almost exactly like the modernized version of the text. It will keep them dominant and submissive in their respective roles, of course. The modernized version merely allows for there to be same-sex claims, for the two to be held as equal individuals regarding property ownership, and includes a place to list safewords, safesignals, and hard kinks. The first two they breezed over, agreeing that the traditional words and signals were fine to use and if they thought of anything better over time it would be changed, but last list they’re having trouble filling out—as is evidenced by Blaine’s near uncomfortable silence.

“Sweetheart?”

Blaine bites his lip and nudges his head further into Kurt’s thigh. “I—I don’t really know, sir.”

“Did anything you researched at the library seem like—too much?” Blaine’s reticence is worrying Kurt. He seems to be distancing himself the very moment they are bringing themselves closer than ever. It’s… not great.

Blaine turns the words over in his mind—too much, too much. What would be too much? He doesn’t know. He’s not—he’s realizing, he thinks, just how little experience he has. It’s terrifying. He doesn’t know how far he can push himself, he doesn’t know how far Kurt can push him. Compared to Kurt, it must seem like he knows nothing about the realm of dominance and submission. He shrinks away from the once-comforting warmth of Kurt’s leg. It’s too much. This is too much.

“Blaine?”

Fuck. Kurt’s losing him. He’s losing Blaine and he doesn’t even know what’s wrong—because Blaine won’t _tell_ him. In the space of thirty seconds Kurt rethinks everything he’s ever known to be right. He knows he loves this boy beneath him as much as he loves this boy beside him. He knows that Blaine loves him. He thinks maybe—gods, maybe they’re moving too fast. Kurt swallows and feels Blaine shift away from him. He does the only thing he can do, then—the only thing in this strange limbo of there and not really there, of knowing and not really knowing, that he knows how to do.

“On the bed. Now.”

Kurt gives Blaine three seconds to register the words—and then, thank the gods, he’s moving and on the bed kneeling and—no. No no no no no no no.

“Don’t—kneel. Um, can you just sit?” It’s a question. That strikes Blaine. He sits crosslegged on the bed and stares at Kurt, honey-colored eyes quizzical but clouded.

“Sir?”

Kurt feels like he’s been punched in the gut—all the air has rushed out of his lungs at once. He feels slightly nauseous, forcing words through the sudden block in his throat. “I’m—I’m Kurt, right now.”

Blaine’s eyes clear. He grabs Kurt’s hands from where they’re restless in his lap and pulls him onto the bed beside him. “Hey—Kurt. What’s wrong?”

Kurt blinks. Words spill out of him with the rest of his breath. “Ithinkmaybewe’removingtoofast. Blaine—I mean—” He struggles to sound coherent. He squeezes Blaine’s wrists together and pulls himself back. “I’ve known you for barely a month and a half now. I’m actually kind of scared that we’re doing this all wrong.” Kurt huffs. It sounds like a laugh with the humor drawn out of it. “We’ve, honestly, not really had sex. The only thing I know for sure right now in this moment is that I love you and that I’m _terrified_. I’ve never fallen this far this fast and I can’t see a way out without crashing.”

Blaine blinks once, slow and careful. His eyelashes are strangely hypnotic, black as the birds that wing in Vs over the sky in autumn. His skin is smooth as silk still, the slightest calluses trying to form from his unlabored hands. “I’m scared too. Not—not just because you are, though I think that’s definitely a part of it. I just—there are so many things that you’re going to need to teach me, because I can’t just read them and know what they are or how they’ll affect me—I’m scared that you’re going to give up on teaching me and go find someone who already knows.” Kurt starts to say something, but Blaine shakes his head. “Listen—I know you’re four years my senior. I know I’m inexperienced. It’s not any easier for me being my half of the relationship than it is for you being yours.  We—we probably both forget that. Kurt, I do think we’re moving too fast. I’m glad you said something—I’m glad I can trust you to say something.” He takes a breath, and Kurt speaks.

“Blaine, I can’t trust myself. I love you and I love doing things to you and I don’t want us to stop just because we’re afraid. But I think—we need more time. I need more time, anyway. I’ve honestly not had very intense or difficult relationships before, sexual or otherwise. And I don’t want us rushing this. Claiming is a big deal—you’re well aware. This kind of relationship is completely new to the both of us. It’s exciting and different and I wouldn’t give it up for the world, you know. But I think we both need more time before we can do this.”

Blaine nods. His body is tingling. “Can I—please can I—” Kurt watches the slide of his throat. He knows the change in Blaine’s voice, the seeking tone that now lies under his words. His thumbs sweep gently over Blaine’s wrists. “Can I kiss you, please?”

Kurt smiles. “Yes, beautiful.”

-

“So I was hoping,” Chandler says, breathing labored as he stares up at Andrew from his knees, “that we could discuss the situation of the Anderson and Smythe kingdoms?”

Andrew runs a hand through Chandler’s hair softly and smiles. “I should think that after that, you wouldn’t speak in such full sentences.”

Chandler’s eyebrows raise. “I’ve had more than a few dominants, your majesty. I’m used to things being done to me. I’m also used to running kingdoms backstage while the nobles go put on their show. Something needs to be done about this. Queen Helena—”

“This doesn’t involve my kingdom,” Andrew says. His voice and expression have become bitter. “Explain to me why I care.”

Chandler rolls his eyes. “Jealousy does not become you.” The hand in his hair is removed sudden and harsh.

“I’m not—you’re not—we just—” Andrew bites his lip and sinks down into his loveseat. “Chandler, I don’t do morning afters very well.”

“Nor do I,” Chandler says, voice softening. “Look, I’m sorry. I swear I’m not using you for information—not anymore, anyway. Last night—meant something. I’m—” he sighs, and Andrew’s hand comes back down to rest on his head. “I’m not good at this.”

“I’m sorry for cutting you off,” Andrew says. “Can you—join me, up here, and you’ll tell me all your brilliant ideas?”

Chandler grins, sliding up onto the loveseat as Andrew hooks an arm around his waist. “If that’s what you want, Mr. Explain-to-me-why-I-care.”

Andrew sucks in his top lip. “I said I’m sorry. It’s important to you. I should be willing to listen. It does involve my kingdom if we are to make the Crawford and Smythe kingdoms one. And if it’ll get Adam off my back—”

“Queen Helena of the Smythe kingdom was not born submissive,” Chandler says, curling into Andrew’s side. “She closed Prince Sebastian’s circle with black and opened her own with brown. The king and she were never intimate enough for him to discover what she had done. She was his favorite mistress, but out of all of them, they rarely had sex. Certainly they never touched each other’s marks, as that would’ve exposed her deceit entirely. She was extremely guarded, and now, as Sebastian will not ascend the throne left to him, claims to be guilt-stricken by the death of King James.”

“You want her to rule the conjoined kingdoms?” Andrew interjects, confused. “What if she doesn’t agree—”

“Unclaimed dominants need control,” Chandler says carefully. He thinks of Cooper, pacing the Great Hall. “You’ve had enough—partners to satisfy yourself, that you don’t feel the urge as much, but they need to control _something_. Even if it’s not another person. Queen Helena has been unattached for a very long time. I think she’s not in mourning. I think she’s have extreme bouts of dominant urges and trying to suppress them. Because King James is dead, she’s no longer manipulating him—controlling him. She needs something to have power over, you see. Two kingdoms combining—it’s a lot for your younger brother to take on. He is unfortunately inexperienced. But I think, if Prince Sebastian helped Queen Helena, they’d be a good team. King James was not a popular man. Once word gets out that Sebastian is submissive, I hardly think it will matter with Helena at his side. What do you think?”

Andrew is grinning. “I knew I liked you for a reason,” he says smugly. “My taste is impeccable—”

“If I am your taste, I cannot disagree.”

“I think your brilliant ideas will work themselves out once Adam and Sebastian get through to Queen Helena,” Andrew says, pressing a kiss to Chandler’s jaw. “I think that now that you’ve had a chance to share your brilliant ideas regarding the kingdoms, it’s my turn to share my brilliant ideas regarding you.”

Chandler tilts his head back under Andrew’s roaming mouth and squeezes his hand where it’s resting on his hip. “I think that’s a wonderful idea.”

 


	12. very important update

okay, first things first, this story is in no way abandoned.  
  
but! unfortunately i don't have access to the computer that the story is on right now, PLUS i'm hitting a dry spell in the writing (i didn't even finish the porn. that is lowwwwwww for me), PLUS i'm going through a lot of school and home related anxiety attacks right now which limits my time to do anything remotely productive. sigh. so this will not be updating as quickly as i wanted it to, and i'm really sorry. but like i said, i'm definitely not done writing their story, and i promise that i'll have another chapter/addition posted as soon as i possibly can. thank you so much for all of your kudos/bookmarks/comments, and i'll see you next whenever i next see you!


	13. an interval of porn. you're welcome.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> man, i am such a piece of shit. i kind of forgot this thing existed, but i promise it's not abandoned and i'm still working on it as long as my brain will keep spouting out random words! in the meantime, please, have some porn. it's set directly after the last actual update so if you need a refresher of where exactly this verse is/where the boys are at this time/what the fuck is going on, you're welcome to reread, but this is literally plotless. to actually summarize: kurt and blaine explore kinks with a game. humiliation is totally a thing. for both of them. nice.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i should also note that this starts out abruptly because it is cut directly from the last part of the story that i posted here. i'm sorry for the awkward beginning, but hey, almost six pages of porn makes up for that, right?

Blaine nods. His body is tingling. “Can I—please can I—” Kurt watches the slide of his throat. He knows the change in Blaine’s voice, the seeking tone that now lies under his words. His thumbs sweep gently over Blaine’s wrists. “Can I kiss you, please?”

Kurt smiles. “Yes, beautiful.” He lets Blaine start, take from him the soft pleasure of lips on lips before he kisses Blaine back. A happy whine builds in the back of Blaine’s throat and releases itself on an exhale. Kurt’s hand comes up, grasping the hinge of Blaine’s jaw to pull him closer, opening Blaine’s mouth to him.

“You are so good for me,” Kurt murmurs, feeling Blaine go limp when he starts to work down from Blaine’s mouth, onto his sensitive throat and the hollow of his neck. “Lie back, love.” Blaine obediently lowers himself the rest of the way down to Kurt’s bed and Kurt follows him, not missing the way his hands come up to rest over his head. “Do you want to be tied up?”

Blaine turns red and mutters something into the pillow. Kurt grins.

“Answer me with words. Do you want your wrists tied?”

Blaine’s voice is quiet but definite. “Yes, Kurt.”

“Good boy,” Kurt says, watching Blaine’s soft, pretty smile spread on his face. He uses one arm to blindly feel for the scarf draped on his desk chair. Bringing it up, he wraps it firm but not tight around one of Blaine’s wrists, then the other, then doubles it back around both before tying it to a slat in the headboard. “Is this okay still?” Blaine tugs his wrists in the scarf experimentally.

“Yes, Kurt.”

He starts back in the dip of Blaine’s neck, the thin skin stretching between his collarbones reddening as Kurt works it under his lips. He unbuttons Blaine’s shirt, not bothering to take it off him completely, and leaves sloppy wet kisses over Blaine’s nipples and sternum before biting gently at his belly. Blaine makes a pretty whimper above him, hips working, but Kurt stills them by putting his arm over Blaine’s waist. “I’m going to play a game with you, sweetie.”

Blaine moans when Kurt’s teeth scrape up over his ribcage. “Yes, Kurt.”

“I’m going to give you two options. You have to choose one or the other. Okay?”

“Yes, Kurt.”

Realizing that Blaine hasn’t spoken anything other than those two words for the past five minutes makes something hot and dark grow in Kurt’s chest. Then he sees the look on his submissive’s face—Blaine is smirking at Kurt, all too pleased. Well. Kurt raises his eyebrows and smiles. Two can play at that game. He’ll just have to reduce Blaine to no words at all.

Immediately Kurt moves further up Blaine’s body, back to his beautifully exposed neck. He eyes the red marks in the meet of Blaine’s clavicles and seals his mouth over them, sucking with the intent to bruise. Blaine’s hips jolt up, only to be met with Kurt’s forearm forcing them back down. “One,” Kurt says, leaving one last little sucking kiss to Blaine’s neck, “or two?” He takes one of Blaine’s wet nipples into his mouth, alternating between sucking it and flicking it with his tongue. Blaine mewls—there is no other word for it—and this time when his hips rock forward, Kurt feels his cock pressing up through his pants.

“Two,” Blaine says, and oh, that’s very good, Kurt didn’t even have to ask him twice. He’ll have to make the choices more difficult.

Moving down Blaine’s chest, Kurt bites at the swell of his belly—harsher than he’s let himself before, the blood rushes to the surface of Blaine’s skin much more quickly now, making Blaine shout. Kurt lets his teeth sink into Blaine’s stomach hard, releasing and biting in quick succession before stopping altogether, leaving Blaine panting, his muscles trembling underneath Kurt’s cheek. “One.” Kurt pauses before pushing his tongue soft into Blaine’s belly button, letting himself taste the bitter, strangely salty skin there and sinking as much of his tongue in as he can before receding. Blaine’s whimper is strained through embarrassment—which means he hasn’t quite given in to the pleasure. Kurt will have to fix that. He bites sharp and unexpected over Blaine’s stomach again, feeling the flesh quiver under his mouth, before digging his tongue back into Blaine’s navel. He can see the flush on Blaine’s neck spreading to his chest and hears what is definitely an aborted moan. “I need an answer,” Kurt says, letting his mouth come off of Blaine’s body completely. “You have to choose one or you don’t get your reward.”

“Tw—unhh, one, one,” Blaine gasps above him. Kurt looks up to see his bound wrists straining at the fabric.

“Do I need to untie you?”

“No Kurt no please you can keep going _please_.” Blaine’s voice goes up an octave on the last word because Kurt might have slid a curious thumb into his belly button. Maybe. Kurt wonders why the choice was more difficult this time. He wonders what Blaine is holding back both from Kurt and from himself. He lowers himself back down and decides that these are definitely good questions—for later.

Blaine breathes a sigh of relief when Kurt tugs his cock from his breeches and then slides them all the way off his legs—he’ll need no fabric obstructions for this. The head of Blaine’s cock is red and purple already, but now he has no stimulation from the cloth that had been covering it. It curves up invitingly and Kurt lets himself ghost a breath over the wet slit just to hear Blaine whine, then bypasses his groin entirely and bends Blaine’s knees to get to his feet. Blaine squirms violently once he realizes Kurt’s intentions, and Kurt purposefully waits a moment before doing anything more—giving him a chance to get out if he needs it—but Blaine is still in anticipation, and Kurt seals his mouth over the bone of Blaine’s ankle and sucks hard, unforgiving pressure from the fragile skin. Blaine makes a noise halfway between a keen and a cry. Kurt pulls off the knob, wipes the back of his hand over his mouth. “One.” Blaine’s cock is throbbing on his stomach. Precome is starting to dribble from its tip and get caught in his belly hair. Kurt considers their respective positions.

“Can you lie on your side without hurting your arms?” he says, already starting to shift Blaine’s legs over.

“Yes, Kurt.”

Blaine turns himself the rest of the way and Kurt is met with the backs of his knees nearly right up against his face, which is exactly where he wants them. “That’s fine on your wrists?” He draws himself up to speak so that Blaine has less of an idea of what he’s going to do and also so he can see the scarf for himself. It’s twisted over once. Blaine’s arms must be tired but not in terrible pain.

“Yes, Kurt.”

Kurt lowers himself back behind Blaine and presses light fluttering kisses all over the tender skin on the backs of his knees. He hears Blaine hiss out a breath that turns into a soft moan when he draws the skin between his lips gently and sucks. “Two,” he says as he releases the skin with a quiet pop. “One or two?”

“One,” Blaine says, following through as Kurt guides him back from his side.

“Your arms and wrists are still okay?” Kurt questions, resisting the temptation to slide his fingers over Blaine’s shoulders and check for himself.

“Yes, Kurt.”

“Good.” Kurt spreads Blaine’s legs finally, making him emit a wordless happy sound, and bends Blaine’s knees up so his feet are flat on the mattress. He wets his thumb with spit before using it to slide between Blaine’s cheeks. The reaction is immediate—Blaine’s cock thrashes up and he whines out something that sounds suspiciously like “ _Kurt_ ”, hips stuttering against the mattress.

“That was just a start,” Kurt tells him, pulling Blaine’s cheeks apart to expose his twitching brown-pink hole. He pushes Blaine’s sac back from the taut skin between his hole and his balls, then leans and sucks a slow wet kiss there, opening and closing his lips around it till Blaine’s voice is high-pitched and sobbing. Kurt knows that he’s indirectly massaging Blaine’s prostate like this. His own neglected cock gives a hard jerk in his pants—Kurt starts, his attention has been so wholly on Blaine that he hadn’t noticed the wet spot he’s been making in his breeches. Blaine’s hole is starting to open against the pressure of Kurt’s chin. Kurt ignores it. “One.” Blaine’s hips cant up, and Kurt braces his arm back against Blaine’s waist, careful not to catch on his hard cock. He keeps Blaine’s hips where they are, tilted up away from the mattress, it won’t be terribly comfortable on Blaine’s spine, but he won’t have to hold it for long. Kurt traces a finger over the sensitive cleft of Blaine’s ass, right where his cheeks start to part. Blaine is trembling against him. Kurt draws his hand back and slaps Blaine’s left cheek with an audible smack. A strangled whine rips from Blaine’s throat as the sting sets in and his hips thrust up hard. “Or two?”

Kurt waits out a few seconds of silence and then pulls himself up to sitting to look at Blaine’s face. He’s shaking his head, tears in the corners of his eyes.

“No what, love?”

“Kurt—” It is more gasp than word. Kurt sits back on his heels. He’s got all the time in the world.

“Yes?”

“I can’t—” Blaine sobs again, the tears starting to streak down his face. “I c-can’t.”

“I think you can, sweetheart,” Kurt says, hand idly stroking Blaine’s asscrack. “Tell me what you need.”

He watches with mild interest as Blaine’s throat bobs once, twice, three times and then the words spill out. “Please touch me please please oh please touch me—”

Kurt grins slow and proud. “I am touching you, silly.” He wanders a finger behind Blaine’s balls, nudging them gently. “See?”

“On my—I need—” Blaine’s gasping again, but Kurt thinks that has more to do with the way he’s started to tease at his hole than an actual blockage of words. “I need your fingers—”

Kurt taps the pad of his index finger against Blaine’s quivering hole. He waits.

“I need your fingers on my cock, please.” The words are barely there, but Kurt hears them loud and clear.

“Good boy,” he praises, wrapping his hand around Blaine’s cock and squeezing under the head. “Like this?”

“Kurt— _Kurt_ —” Blaine whimpers. “I wanna come please, please, I’ve been good can I please—”

Kurt laughs. “You’ve been very good, love. But you’re not coming. No. You need to tell me which one you liked better.” He puts his lips against Blaine’s perineum and sucks that same wet kiss, making Blaine whimper, then pulls back—he sees Blaine tense in anticipation—and spanks him hard again. This time the mark falls on his right cheek. Blaine inhales a sharp, wet breath. “One or two? You don’t get to come till you answer.”

“I can’t—Kurt—I can’t,” Blaine whines, much more coherent now, but still giving an unsatisfactory answer.

“Then you can’t come either,” Kurt says. “Do you need me to do it again?”

“No no no no no no no—no—” Kurt eases Blaine’s hips back onto the bed.

“What’s difficult about it?” he asks, genuinely curious. “They’re very different, love. It’s meant to be an easier choice.”

“It—they—I need, I need to come,” Blaine chokes out. “Kurt please I need it I need it please please Kurt—”

“No,” Kurt says. “Answer me first.”

Blaine’s hips twitch, and twitch, and fall back. Kurt watches with a pleased smile as Blaine goes lax under his restraints. “One,” he says, voice breaking on the word. “One.”

Kurt strokes his cock and Blaine does nothing. He starts to keen on the second upstroke; when Kurt twists his wrist his voice stretches out thin and then breaks when Kurt digs a thumb into a purpling mark on his belly.

“Come, baby.” He closes his lips around the head of Blaine’s cock right and swallows down the thick spurts of semen, pressing a fingertip into Blaine’s perineum and sucking the last drops off when Blaine’s hips stutter and then drop back to the mattress with a thunk.

“Oh my gods.”

Kurt grins and parts Blaine’s cheeks with his thumbs. “Want me to come on your hole, sweetheart? Make you all messy?” Blaine spreads his own ass wide and moans in lieu of an answer, making Kurt hum, pleased. He draws his cock from his trousers and jerks himself once, twice, before coming all over Blaine’s throbbing asshole. Kurt crawls up the bed to spoon around where Blaine is boneless and happy, untying his glowing submissive’s wrists and rubbing them gently.

“Your wrists okay? You doing all right?” He takes the wet washcloth from where it’s been cooling on his nightstand and slips it between Blaine’s cheeks, giving just enough pressure to make Blaine squirm and whine happily.

“Yes, sir. Oh, _oh_ , can you— _fuck_ —do that harder?”

“Greedy,” Kurt murmurs, obliging him nonetheless. “I’ll have to make you mine one day soon, truly claim you here.” He rubs slow circles over Blaine’s rim with the thin cotton before bringing it over his own balls and softening cock, shedding his shirt when he realizes that it took the result of his orgasm the most.

“Mm. Can you talk a moment?” He wraps his arms around Blaine, who snuggles back into him easily.

“Yes, Kurt.”

“Did you like the game?”

Blaine smiles back at him, turning in Kurt’s embrace. “I liked the part where I got to come.”

Kurt raises his eyebrows, returning the smile. “Me too. But before that—what we did—was that okay with you?”

Blaine’s face and neck flame red. “Uh. Mostly?”

“Why were the last two choices so difficult for you, sweetie? Especially the second one.”

Blaine makes a little noise in the back of his throat, ducking his head into Kurt’s neck. He says something there, muffled. Kurt tilts his chin back up with a gentle finger.

“Sweetie?”

Blaine sighs and wriggles in closer. “’S embarrassing.”

Kurt’s eyebrows go up of their own accord this time. “Really? How so?”

A shrug. Kurt traces the blush where it’s crawling down the back of Blaine’s neck with one hand.

“I mean—you licked my _belly button_ , Kurt.”

Kurt can’t help but laugh at Blaine’s scandalized tone. “I’ve licked your armpits, love. And your balls. And inside your hole, and all over your ass. I know you’re ticklish on your stomach, though. Was that a problem?”

Blaine shifts, bites his lip. “Uh. It was—it felt really, really good, actually.”

“Then why did you choose me biting your belly over it? Was it not as good as that?”

Blaine’s skin is turning the color of a ripe strawberry. “Um, no, I—I liked the second one better.” His voice is low, private, like he’s whispering a secret. Kurt doesn’t know why, but he feels like it deserves a reward. He tangles a hand in Blaine’s curls and tugs in the slight way that he likes.

“Good boy. Can you tell me why it was embarrassing? Was it embarrassing because it felt good, or did it feel good because it was embarrassing?”

Blaine squeaks. “ _Kurt_. That’s—isn’t that a kink that was on the claim form?”

Kurt blinks. “Embarrassment? No.”

Blaine looks up at him through those gorgeous thick lashes. “I mean humiliation, sir.”

 _Oh_. Kurt feels his cock twitch against his thigh. That’s—new. “Have you researched that in the library? Is that something you like?”

Blaine presses his groin against Kurt and moans long and low. “What do you think, sir?” Fuck, he’s hard again. Kurt reaches down to squeeze his submissive’s thickening cock.

“Is that why you like me teasing you in public, too? Do you fantasize about someone finding out? Maybe one of the officials, one of them seeing my hand between your cheeks, tracing your hole—”

Kurt’s thumb presses into Blaine’s perineum sharply when he starts writhing and gasping.

“Maybe you like the idea of them watching, too, of me getting you so desperate that you have to drop to your knees in the throne room and just _beg_ —your people all watching their prince, who they’ve watched grow up and develop into the young man he is—who see him as an orderly ruler—would you want them to watch you fall apart?”

His hand has migrated to Blaine’s cock, where it’s leaking at the head and so hard it’s red. He wraps a hand around its base and pulls twice before Blaine whimpers and arches and comes _hard_. It’s mostly long gushes of clear fluid, as Kurt’s other hand is still massaging his perineum, rougher than he should be. Blaine gasps and bucks up into Kurt’s grasp.

“Please—it’s too much, oh gods—”

Kurt’s hands wrap Blaine in a hug instead, stroking up and down his upper spine.

“Good?”

Blaine hums and hooks his chin over Kurt’s shoulder.

“The very best, sir.”

“Don’t think we’re done with this conversation. I want to make a list of kinks that we can try out.”

“Yes, sir.”

“All right, love. Rest for now.”


End file.
